Abstract
Recently, it is sometimes discussed that cortical neurons perform some sort of coincidence detection. This paper proposes a new model for a functional coincidence detector by using neural cells with long membrane time constants. The basic idea is a combinational use of an excitatory output cell and an inhibitory intermediate cell, both of which have common external inputs. The intermediate cell converts an external input into an inhibitory signal and passes it to the output cell with a certain delay time. The delay time performs as a time window of the coincidence detection. Since one external input causes a pair of excitatory input and delayed inhibitory input of the output cell, only coincidental external inputs within the time window can raise the membrane potential of the output cell.
