Measures of Spike Train Synchrony: From Single Neurons to Populations

With the increasing availability of multiunit recordings, the focus of attention isshifting from bivariate estimators of spike train synchrony toward methods thatdescribe patterns of activity across many neurons. Such measures of populationspike train synchrony are becoming indispensable tools for addressing issues suchas spike timing reliability, network synchronization, and neuronal coding. Thischapter will give an overview of different approaches designed to quantify multipleneuron synchrony. It will address both measures of synchrony among one group ofneurons as well as measures that estimate the degree of synchronization betweenpopulations of neurons.