The number of granular cells in a cerebellar neuronal network model engaged during robot control increases with the complexity of the motor task

Abstract

The granular cells (Gr) in the cerebellum have been proposed to perform adaptive spatio-temporal coding [1] to relay rich information to the Purkinje cell, and thus they are critical for the proper operation of the cerebellum [2]. Elimination of all Gr cells induced behavioral symptoms such as ataxia and hypotonia [3]. Partially silencing Gr cells showed that the overall motor performance was minimally affected whereas demanding tasks or memory consolidation processes were compromised [4]. Here we use a physio-anatomically inspired cerebellar neuronal network (CNN) to study the role of the Gr cells during control of an unstable two-wheel balancing robot [5].