Hippocampal-medial prefrontal cortex network dynamics predict performance during retrieval in a context-guided object memory task

MORICI, JUAN FACUNDO; WEISSTAUB, NOELIA VICTORIA; ZOLD, CAMILA LIDIA

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America

NLM (Medline)

Año: 2022 vol. 119

SignificanceRecovering relevant information, while ignoring the irrelevant, is crucial for episodic memory (remembering a particular event at a specific temporal and spatial context). Information presented at any time could drive the retrieval of more than one memory trace; thus, there should be a mechanism to select the retrieval of the most relevant trace. However, how the brain controls memory interference is not well understood. Here, we analyzed the communication between ventral hippocampus (vHPC) and medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) during the resolution of an episodic memory task in rats. We found an increased synchronization between the vHPC and mPFC and identified specific mPFC neural subpopulations that selectively respond to object-context associations, and their firing preference correlates with the animals´ behavioral responses.