Energy consumption and information transmission in model neurons

This work deals with the problem of whether biological computation optimizes energy use in the way neurons communicate. By assigning an electrical energy function to a Hindmarsh–Rose neuron we are able to find its average energy consumption when it reacts to incoming signals sent by another neuron coupled to it by an electrical synapse. We find that there are values of the coupling strength at which the ratio of mutual information to energy consumption is maximum and, therefore, communicating at these coupling values would be energetically the most efficient option.