Integration of New Information with Active Memory Accounts for Retrograde Amnesia: A Challenge to the Consolidation/Reconsolidation Hypothesis?

Abstract

This study provides evidence challenging the traditional consolidation/reconsolidation hypotheses that have dominated the literature over the past 50 years. Based on amnesia studies, that hypothesis states that active (i.e., new and reactivated) memories are similarly labile and (re)established in a time-dependent manner within the brain through processes that require de novo protein synthesis. Our data show that new/reactivated memories can be formed without protein synthesis and that amnesia can be induced by drugs that do not affect protein synthesis. We propose that amnesia results from memory integration of the internal state produced by the drug that is subsequently necessary for retrieval of the memory. This interpretation gives a dynamic view of memory, rapidly stored and easily updated when active.