Neurology of memory

NATESAN AND VARUN

forms, figures, shapes, objects, ideas, apprehensions, motions, revolutions: these are begot in the ventricle of memory, nourished in the womb of pia mater, and delivered upon the mellowing of occasion.
Shakespeare, Love's Labour's Lost

HM, in an interval between psychological tests, he looked up and said rather anxiously,

Right now, I'm wondering. Have I done or said anything amiss? You see, at this moment everything looks clear to me, but what happened just before? That's what worries me. It's like waking from a dream; I just don't remember.

Learning is defined as a relatively permanent change in performance caused by experience. Memory is maintaining the learning retrieving at later time.

Memory is a basic function for survival of the individual and the species. Its functions are represented in an extensive number of brain structures

TYPES OF LONG TERM MEMORY

Declarative (explicit)

Procedural (implicit)

Episodic (working)

Semantic (reference)

Skills

Priming

Conditioning

Non-associative

MTL: (para)hippocampal cortex Striatum & Diencephalon Cortex

Emotional Motor responses responses Reflex Amygdala Cerebellum paths

(Adapted from L.R. Squire: Memory and the Brain , 1987)

CLASSIC MODELS OF WORKING MEMORY

Atkinson and Shiffrin: Short term store and long term store Baddeley and Hitch: Three Component model of working memory

Atkinson and Shiffrin (1968)

Problems with Atkinson and Shiffrin model

Model says STS required for entry into LTS
A neurological patient with defective short term memory (as measured by digit span) showed normal long term learning. (Shallice and Warrington 1970)

Model says length of time in STS determines likelihood of LTM storage

Length of time in STM does not necessarily result in transfer to LTM. Depth of processing is more important (Craik and Tulving, 1975)

Quoting The Handbook of Memory Disorders

Baddeley and Hitch (1974)

Working memory
(instead of short term memory)

Visualspatial sketchpad

Central Executive

Phonological Loop

Norman and Shollice (1986)

supervisor attentional system

(instead of Central executive)

Superior attentional system Visualspatial sketchpad Phonological Loop

Miller (1956)

Episodic memory
(fourth component of working memory)

Superior attentional system Visualspatial sketchpad Phonological Loop

Episodic buffer

Neuroanatomy of the memory

TYPES OF LONG TERM MEMORY

Declarative (explicit)

Procedural (implicit)

Episodic (working)

Semantic (reference)

Skills

Priming

Conditioning

Non-associative

MTL: (para)hippocampal cortex Striatum & Diencephalon Cortex

Emotional Motor responses responses Reflex Amygdala Cerebellum paths

from L.R. Squire, 1987)

Temporal lobe
Forms part of Papez circuit and important for - explicit memory. - memory consolidation.

The temporal lobe

Left temporal lobe damage typically have more difficulty learning and remembering verbal material, such as stories or word lists. Right temporal lobe damage difficulty with nonverbal material, such as abstract geometric patterns, faces, tonal patterns, or the spatial location of objects..

MTL & Related Structures

Mediodorsal thalamic nucleus Anterior thalamic nucleus Precommissural Fornix Postcommissural Fornix Anterior commissure Septal nuclei Mammillary bodies Amygdala Pes Hippocampi

Cingulate Gyrus Fornix Corpus Callosum

Alveus of the hippocampus Parahippocampal Dentate Gyrus gyrus Subiculum

Schumann C M et al. J. Neurosci. 2004;24:6392-6401

2004 by Society for Neuroscience

Schumann C M et al. J. Neurosci. 2004;24:6392-6401

2004 by Society for Neuroscience

Stress, amygdala and memory

Aversive learning or fear conditioning occurs in central nucleus of amygdala. The long term memory of this is stored insular cortex. Stress triggers increase in glucocorticoids and NA. The NA increases the arousal. Glucocorticoids stimulate the amygdala and improve memory at low stress levels

 CHRONIC,HIGH STRESS LEVELS DOWN-GRADE THE STEROID RECEPTORS.

POOR MEMORY

Sagittal view of the brain showing the location of the amygdaloid complex of nuclei in the temporal lobe.

Coronal section through the forebrain at the leveel of the amygdala.

Dorsolateral Prefrontal lobes working memory

Striatum
Responsible for motor skill learning caudate nucleus : habit formation connecting motivational values to sensory stimuli

Forgetting
definitive loss of information or the failure in retrieving it at a certain point in time. Mechanism of forgetting: - failure of consolidation. - interferance( proactive / retroactive) - time decay.

Biblography
Encyclopedia of the Human Brain, Volume 2. The Handbook of Memory Disorders Second edition - Baddelley Forgetting Sergio Dalla Sala The new cognitive neurosciences Second edition - Michael S. Gazzaniga Memory and Brain Systems: 1969 2009 Larry R. Squire The Journal of Neuroscience, October 14, 2009
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