Generalized prefrontal task-progress sequences efficiently encode task structure
- 1Saarland University, Center for Integrative Physiology and Molecular Medicine, Homburg, Germany
Abstract
The medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) occupies a central role in executive function including decision-making, rule learning and cognitive flexibility. Here, we investigated how mPFC populations represent the animal's progression along sequential task stages. Freely moving mice performed an odour-guided two-choice task requiring sensory sampling, action selection, navigation, and reward collection. Population activity in the mPFC formed sequences that evolved through cue sampling, movement towards the reward sites, and reward-related epochs. These sequences exhibited a shared temporal organization across trial types, pointing to a generalized encoding of task progress by prefrontal neurons. Artificial neural networks trained on the same task developed task-progress sequences, and experimentally disrupting task-progress tuning in these networks impaired learning efficiency. Our results indicate that mPFC activity organizes behavioural episodes along correlated trajectories and suggest that task-progress tuning offers an efficient solution for the encoding of task space during multi-stage behaviour.
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BibTeX
@misc{tarahi2026generalized,
title = {{Generalized prefrontal task-progress sequences efficiently encode task structure}},
author = {O. Tarahi and K. Koshy and J.-F. Sauer},
howpublished = {bioRxiv},
year = {2026},
month = oct,
doi = {10.64898/2026.10.20.760165},
url = {https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.10.20.760165v1},
note = {CC BY},
}
RIS
TY - UNPB
TI - Generalized prefrontal task-progress sequences efficiently encode task structure
AU - O. Tarahi
AU - K. Koshy
AU - J.-F. Sauer
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/10/20
PB - bioRxiv
DO - 10.64898/2026.10.20.760165
UR - https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.10.20.760165v1
AB - The medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) occupies a central role in executive function including decision-making, rule learning and cognitive flexibility. Here, we investigated how mPFC populations represent the animal's progression along sequential task stages. Freely moving mice performed an odour-guided two-choice task requiring sensory sampling, action selection, navigation, and reward collection. Population activity in the mPFC formed sequences that evolved through cue sampling, movement towards the reward sites, and reward-related epochs. These sequences exhibited a shared temporal organization across trial types, pointing to a generalized encoding of task progress by prefrontal neurons. Artificial neural networks trained on the same task developed task-progress sequences, and experimentally disrupting task-progress tuning in these networks impaired learning efficiency. Our results indicate that mPFC activity organizes behavioural episodes along correlated trajectories and suggest that task-progress tuning offers an efficient solution for the encoding of task space during multi-stage behaviour.
ER -