Fluctuating excitability: A mechanism for self-sustained information flow in excitable arrays

We show that the fluctuating excitability of FitzHugh–Nagumo neurons, constituting a diffusively coupled excitable array, can induce phase slips that lead to a symmetry break yielding a preferred spreading direction of excitatory events, thus enabling persistent self-sustained and self-organized information flow in a periodic array long after a localized stimulus perturbation has sized. Possible oscillation frequencies of the information-carrying signal are expressed analytically, and necessary conditions for the phenomenon are derived. Our results suggest that cellular diversity in neural tissue is crucial for maintaining self-sustained and organized activity in the brain even in the absence of immediate stimuli, thus facilitating continuous evolution of its mechanisms for information retrieval and storage.