New paper is accepted in the Journal of Neuroscience

Cortical neurons often respond to identical sensory stimuli with large variability. However, under certain conditions, the same neurons can also respond highly reliably. The circuit mechanisms that contribute to this modulation remain unknown. Here we used novel dual-wavelength calcium imaging and temporally selective optical perturbation to identify an inhibitory neural circuit in visual cortex that can modulate the reliability of pyramidal neurons to naturalistic visual stimuli. Our results, supported by computational models, suggest that somatostatin interneurons increase pyramidal neuron reliability by suppressing parvalbumin interneurons via the inhibitory SST→PV circuit. These findings reveal a novel role of the SST→PV circuit in modulating the fidelity of neural coding critical for visual perception.