Amnesia or reversal of forgetting by anticholinesterase, depending simply on time of injection.

ABSTRACT

The effect of intracerebral injections of the anticholinesterase drug diisopropyl fluorophosphate in rats was to produce good recall of an otherwise almost forgotten habit learned 28 days before. The same injections produced temporary amnesia for the same habit, otherwise well remembered, learned 14 days before. The injections had no ef fect on the memory of the same habit when it was only partly learned 14 days before. The results support the hy pothesis that the physiological basis of memory lies in an increase, and for getting in a decrease, in synaptic con ductance.