An Area Specialized for Spatial Working Memory in Human Frontal Cortex

Courtney, Susan; Petit, Laurent; Maisog, José M.; Ungerleider, Leslie G.; Haxby, James V.

doi:10.1126/science.279.5355.1347

Cited by 858 publications

(615 citation statements)

References 31 publications

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“…This is exactly what has been reported now several times in unit recordings in the PFC of monkeys [5][6][7]28,33,39]. A few event-related fMRI studies have varied the length of the retention delay up to 24 s and have reported that the DLPFC activity does indeed span the entire delay [34 -37].…”

Section: Memory Load Effectssupporting

confidence: 77%

“…Positional information might be represented in oculomotor coordinates, where the memorized location is maintained in terms of a saccade vector that acquires the target. Therefore, rehearsal of locations could simply be reactivations of oculomotor programs without actually making overt eye movements and can account for consistent activation of the frontal eye-fields (FEF) during spatial working memory tasks [33]. Clear segregations by the type of rehearsal strategy exist in the frontal cortex [59].…”

Section: Rehearsal Processesmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Persistent activity in the prefrontal cortex during working memory

Curtis

D’Esposito

2003

Trends in Cognitive Sciences

1,726

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The dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) plays a crucial role in working memory. Notably, persistent activity in the DLPFC is often observed during the retention interval of delayed response tasks. The code carried by the persistent activity remains unclear, however. We critically evaluate how well recent findings from functional magnetic resonance imaging studies are compatible with current models of the role of the DLFPC in working memory. These new findings suggest that the DLPFC aids in the maintenance of information by directing attention to internal representations of sensory stimuli and motor plans that are stored in more posterior regions.Working memory refers to the temporary representation of information that was just experienced or just retrieved from long-term memory. These active representations are short-lived, but can be maintained for longer periods of time through active rehearsal strategies, and can be subjected to various operations that manipulate the information in such a way that makes it useful for goaldirected behavior. Most definitions of working memory include both storage and (executive) control components [1]. Cognitive neuroscientists are searching for ways to disassociate the separate components of working memory in attempts to localize and clearly characterize their neural implementation. The prefrontal cortex (PFC) is thought to be the most important substrate for working memory (Fig. 1). Two key findings from studies of monkeys performing delayed response tasks suggest a crucial role for the PFC in working memory. First, experimental lesions of the principal sulcus in the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) cause delay-dependent impairments [2][3][4]. That is, forgetting increases not only when a delay is imposed but increases with the length of the delay. Second, neurophysiological unit recordings from the DLPFC often show persistent, sustained levels of neuronal firing during the retention interval of delayed response Fig. 1. Lateral surface of (a) macaque and (b) human brain. The PFC is composed of lateral, medial, and orbital sectors that are believed to be functionally distinct given the selective effects of damage and distribution of afferent and efferent projections. The tinted areas correspond to those defined by Petrides and Pandya [71] based on cytoarchitecture and connectivity. Notably, the mid-DLPFC comprises areas 46 and 9/46 and the mid-VLPFC comprises areas 45 and 47/12. Note that much of area 46 lies in the depths of the principle sulcus of the monkey and the intermediate frontal sulcus of the human. Frontal premotor regions are also highlighted. The frontal eye field (F) in the macaque lies in the anterior bank of the arcuate sulcus in area 8A. In the human, F is found in the vicinity of the precentral sulcus and superior frontal sulcus junction (area 6 and maybe the caudal-most portion of 8A). The frontal eye field is a premotor region involved in the control of eye movements. Broca's area (B, area 44) is also a premotor area that is involved in the product...

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Section: Memory Load Effectssupporting

confidence: 77%

Section: Rehearsal Processesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Persistent activity in the prefrontal cortex during working memory

Curtis

D’Esposito

2003

Trends in Cognitive Sciences

1,726

101

1,184

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

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“…This suggests that these DLPFC maps cannot be strongly activated by merely remembering a location; instead, they are interested in both location and content. In contrast, the pre-FEF, an area that has been shown to be specialized for spatial working memory (Courtney et al, 1998), displayed robust map activity (and contralateral preference) in our saccade mapping experiments (Hagler et al, in preparation); whereas with the 2-back identity task, the contralateral preference is largely confined to the FEF (Fig. 3).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 68%

Spatial maps in frontal and prefrontal cortex

2006

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“…In a third study, Thompson-Schill et al (1997) found that activation within the left inferior frontal gyrus increased whenever subjects performed a task that required them to retrieve only some facts about an item while ignoring others. In addition, a number of fMRI studies have identified regions within the frontal lobe that are active when subjects must hold faces (Courtney et al, 1997;Cohen et al, 1997) or locations (Courtney et al, 1998; but see Owen et al, 1998) in working memory. In all these studies, there is a common theme: Frontal activation does not correspond to memory recall per se, but to mechanisms that guide memory recall, such as choosing one memory over another or holding a memory available for imminent use.…”

Section: The Frontal Lobesmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Neural-Cognitive Basis of the Jamesian Stream of Thought

Epstein

2000

Consciousness and Cognition

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William James described the stream of thought as having two components: (1) a nucleus of highly conscious, often perceptual material; and (2) a fringe of dimly felt contextual information that controls the entry of information into the nucleus and guides the progression of internally directed thought. Here I examine the neural and cognitive correlates of this phenomenology. A survey of the cognitive neuroscience literature suggests that the nucleus corresponds to a dynamic global buffer formed by interactions between different regions of the brain, while the fringe corresponds to a set of mechanisms in the frontal and medial temporal lobes that control the contents of this global buffer. A consequence of this account is that there might be conscious imagistic representations that are not part of the nucleus. I argue that phenomenology can be linked to psychology and neuroscience and a meaningful way that illuminates both.

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An Area Specialized for Spatial Working Memory in Human Frontal Cortex

Cited by 858 publications

References 31 publications

Persistent activity in the prefrontal cortex during working memory

Persistent activity in the prefrontal cortex during working memory

Spatial maps in frontal and prefrontal cortex

The Neural-Cognitive Basis of the Jamesian Stream of Thought

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