  Conventional deep brain stimulation (DBS) of basal ganglia uses
high-frequency regular electrical pulses to treat Parkinsonian motor symptoms
and has a series of limitations. Relatively new and not yet clinically tested
optogenetic stimulation is an effective experimental stimulation technique to
affect pathological network dynamics. We compared the effects of electrical and
optogenetic stimulation of the basal ganglia on the pathological parkinsonian
rhythmic neural activity. We studied the network response to electrical
stimulation and excitatory and inhibitory optogenetic stimulations. Different
stimulations exhibit different interactions with pathological activity in the
network. We studied these interactions for different network and stimulation
parameter values. Optogenetic stimulation was found to be more efficient than
electrical stimulation in suppressing pathological rhythmicity. Our findings
indicate that optogenetic control of neural synchrony may be more efficacious
than electrical control because of the different ways of how stimulations
interact with network dynamics.
