A general error-modulated STDP learning rule applied to reinforcement learning in the basal ganglia

Cognitive and Systems Neuroscience, 2011

Trevor Bekolay, Chris Eliasmith

Abstract

We present a novel error-modulated spike-timing-dependent learning rule that utilizes a global error signal and the tuning properties of neurons in a population to learn arbitrary transformations on n-dimensional signals. This rule addresses the gap between low-level spike-timing learning rules modifying individual synaptic weights and higher-level learning schemes that characterize behavioural changes in an animal. The learning rule is first analyzed in a small spiking neural network. Using the encod- ing/decoding framework described by Eliasmith and Anderson (2003), we show that the rule can learn linear and non-linear transformations on n-dimensional signals. The learning rule arrives at a connection weight matrix that differs significantly from the connection weight matrix found analytically by Eliasmith and Anderson\textquoteright s method, but performs similarly well. We then use the learning rule to augment Stewart et al.\textquoteright s biologically plausible imple- mentation of action selection in the basal ganglia (2009). Their implementation forms the \actor " module in the actor-critic reinforcement learning architecture described by Barto (1995). We add a \critic " module, inspired by the physiology of the ventral striatum, that can modulate the model\textquoteright s likelihood of selecting actions based on the current state and the history of rewards obtained as a result of taking certain actions in that state. Despite being a complicated model with several interconnected populations, we are able to use our learning rule without any modifications. As a result, we suggest that this rule provides a unique and biologically plausible characterization of supervised and semi- supervised learning in the brain.

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Cognitive and Systems Neuroscience
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Cognitive and Systems Neuroscience

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