NERVE-CELL SPIKE TRAIN DATA-ANALYSIS - A PROGRESSION OF TECHNIQUE

Collections of occurrence times of events taking place irregularly in time provide a fairly common, but not broadly discussed, data type. This article is concerned with the particular circumstance of firing times in nerve cells that interact and form networks. The article reviews a progression of statistical analysis techniques: description, association as measured by moments and correlation, regression, and finally likelihood. The data is point process, but may be seen as that of regression and of multivariate analysis in standard parlance. A simple description of data collected simultaneously for one or more cells is provided.