Abstract
What is the nature of the cortical organization that gives rise to binding codes in the neural representation of objects and events? Unfortunately, the details of cortical circuit connection and many of the details of cortical cell physiology are far from completely understood. Furthermore, none of the current hypothetical structures proposed by various researchers are free from disagreement with experimental data at the detail level. In this paper those facts that are generally agreed to at the present time by a majority of neuroscientists are reviewed with the goal of putting together a comprehensive picture of the role of functional column structure in the neocortex. We first review the state of knowledge of neocortical organization. We then review the mathematical theories of oscillator and wave models in the context of functional column structure and discuss their implications for larger-scale modeling of object and event binding through retroactive multiregional feedback. In the course of this review, we will examine the implications for the chain-of-oscillators, synchrony, and wave propagation paradigms for modeling neural binding code mechanisms