Visual working memory and delay activity in highly selective neurons in the inferior temporal cortex

Natasha Sigala

doi:10.3389/neuro.06.011.2009

Abstract

Visual working memory and delay activity in highly selective neurons in the inferior temporal cortex

Highlights

Visual working memory (VWM) is the kind of active memory needed to represent and monitor visual information in the short term and is often studied with delayed match-to-sample (DMS) tasks
In the first three conditions there was selective delay activity at the level of the cell population, while in the fourth and most relevant condition, the selectivity was not significant at the level of the population, it was evident in 10 cells, which is comparable to the proportion reported earlier (19/171 or 11.11% cells, Mikami, 1995)
A linear Support Vector Machine classification analysis showed that combining the selective activity of a small number of cells (64) yields significant classification for effective vs. ineffective stimuli even for the delay activity of the complex distractor trials, with the reliability of the classification improving towards the end of the delay period

Summary

Introduction

Visual working memory (VWM) is the kind of active memory needed to represent and monitor visual information in the short term and is often studied with delayed match-to-sample (DMS) tasks. In a recent paper Woloszyn and Sheinberg (2009) report highly relevant findings for the robustness of delay activity in the ITC of monkeys performing a delay task.

Results

Conclusion