ABSTRACT
Inhibitory interneurons provide several very important functions: (1) reducing the signal-to-noise ratio; (2) producing phasic responding and helping to delineate the onset of events; (3) protecting existing connections from weakening with overuse; and (4) contributing to the strengthening of connections that manage to activate them. In this chapter we see also how they can produce a general suppression of firing along all pathways in a given system and how this and the other functions allow them to play a major role in selective attention and memory storage.
