How to read a burst duration code

Brief, high-frequency bursts are commonly observed in neuronal recordings and are thought to represent a special neural code. Bursts have variable durations and spike counts which can encode stimulus variables. Here we examine how a burst duration code can be read out by synapses with short-term dynamics. We find that synapses can be tuned to preferentially respond to specific burst durations and the published range of facilitation and depression time-scales matches the typical burst patterns. These findings demonstrate the decodability of a neural code based on burst duration.