Delay adaptation in the nervous system

Time delays are ubiquitous in the nervous system. Empirical "ndings suggest that time delays are adapted when considering the synchronous activity of neurons. We introduce a framework for studying the dynamics of self-organized delay adaptation in systems which optimize coincidence of inputs. The framework comprises two families of delay adaptation mechanisms, delay shift and delay selection. For the important case of periodically modulated input we derive conditions for the existence and stability of solutions which constrain learning rules for reliable delay adaptation. Delay adaptation is also applicable in the case of several spatiotemporal neuronal input patterns. ( 2000 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.