Abstract
Memories of past events and common knowledge are critical to flexibly adjust one’s future behavior based on prior experiences. The formation and the transformation of these memories into a long-lasting form are supported by a dialogue between populations of neurons in the cortex and the hippocampus. Not all experiences are remembered equally well or equally long. It has been demonstrated experimentally in humans that memory strength positively relates to the behavioral relevance of the associated experience. Behavioral paradigms that test the selective retention of memory in rodents would enable further investigation of the neuronal mechanisms at play. We developed a novel paradigm to follow the repeated acquisition and retrieval of two contextually distinct, yet concurrently learned, food-place associations in rats. We demonstrated the use of this paradigm by varying the amount of reward associated with the two locations. After delays of 2 h or 20 h, rats showed better memory performance for experience associated with large amount of reward. This effect depends on the level of spatial integration required to retrieve the associated location. Thus, this paradigm is suited to study the preferential retention of relevant experiences in rats.
Highlights
Memory is the ability of the brain to encode and store information for later use
In the instruction phase of the task, we first asked whether the behavior of the rats differed between large and small reward instruction trials, as evidence of fast acquisition of the association between reward magnitude and targets in left/right environment
When analyzed separately for each of the 5 trial blocks, we observed that running speed was low in the first trial block and increased in the second trial block for both large and small reward conditions (Figure 2A, right)
Summary
Memory is the ability of the brain to encode and store information for later use. Following initial formation (encoding), a memory trace undergoes active post-processing that stabilizes the trace and integrates it into the brain’s existing knowledge base (consolidation). Both encoding and consolidation are supported by the coordinated activity of neuronal ensembles in the hippocampus and cortical areas (Battaglia et al, 2011). It engages a bidirectional corticohippocampal dialogue characterized by the occurrence of cortical slow wave oscillations, spindles and hippocampal sharp wave ripples (SWRs) (Todorova and Zugaro, 2020)
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