The brain’s spatial map is supported by place cells, encoding current location, and grid cells, which report horizontal distance traveled by producing evenly sized and spaced foci of activity (firing fields) that tile the environment surface. Casalia et al. 2019 investigated whether the metric properties of the cells’ activity are the same in vertical space as in horizontal.

On a vertical wall, grid-cell firing fields were enlarged and more widely spaced, while place-cell firing fields were unchanged in size/shape but less prevalent. Sensitivity of single-cell and population field potential activity to running speed was reduced. Together, these results suggest that spatial encoding properties are determined by an interaction between the body-plane alignment and the gravity axis.

For further info, please read the paper Casalia et al. 2019.

Giulio Casali, Daniel Bush, Kate Jeffery. Altered neural odometry in the vertical dimension. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Feb 2019, 201811867; DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1811867116