Trial-by-Trial Hippocampal Encoding Activation Predicts the Fidelity of Cortical Reinstatement During Subsequent Retrieval.

According to current models of episodic memory, the hippocampus binds together the neural representation of an experience during encoding such that it can be reinstated in cortex during subsequent retrieval. However, direct evidence linking hippocampal engagement during encoding with subsequent cortical reinstatement during retrieval is lacking. In this study, we aim to directly test the relationship between hippocampal activation during encoding and cortical reinstatement during retrieval. During a scanned encoding session, human participants studied Noun-Sound and Noun-Picture pairs. One day later, during a scanned retrieval session, participants retrieved the sounds and pictures when given the nouns as cues. First, we found that trial-by-trial hippocampal encoding activation was related to trial-by-trial reactivation during retrieval as measured by the univariate BOLD response in several modality-specific cortical regions. Second, using multivariate measures, we found a correlation between encoding-retrieval pattern similarity computed for each trial and hippocampal encoding activation on the corresponding encoding event, suggesting that the magnitude of hippocampal activation during an experience is related to the fidelity of subsequent reinstatement of cortical activity patterns during retrieval. Consistent with current theories of episodic memory, our findings demonstrate a critical link between initial hippocampal activation during an experience and subsequent cortical reinstatement.

Neural correlates of binding lyrics and melodies for the encoding of new songs.

Songs naturally bind lyrics and melody into a unified representation. Using a subsequent memory paradigm, we examined the neural processes associated with binding lyrics and melodies during song encoding. Participants were presented with songs in two conditions: a unified condition (melodies sung with lyrics), and a separate condition (melodies sung with the syllable "la"). In both cases, written lyrics were displayed and participants were instructed to memorize them by repeating them covertly or by generating mental images of the songs. We expected the unified condition to recruit the posterior superior temporal gyrus, known to be involved in perceptual integration of songs, as well as the left inferior frontal gyrus (IFG). Conversely, we hypothesized that the separate condition would engage a larger network including the hippocampus to bind lyrics and melodies of songs, and the basal ganglia and the cerebellum to ensure the correct sequence coupling of verbal and musical information in time. Binding lyrics and melodies in the unified condition revealed activation of the left IFG, bilateral middle temporal gyrus (MTG), and left motor cortex, suggesting a strong linguistic processing for this condition. Binding in the separate compared to the unified condition revealed greater activity in the right hippocampus as well as other areas including the left caudate, left cerebellum, and right IFG. This study provides novel evidence for the role of the right hippocampus in binding lyrics and melodies in songs. Results are discussed in light of studies of binding in the visual domain and highlight the role of regions involved in timing and synchronization such as the basal ganglia and the cerebellum.

Perirhinal and parahippocampal cortices differentially contribute to later recollection of object- and scene-related event details.

How the different elements of our experiences are encoded into episodic memories has remained one of the major questions in memory research. Although the pivotal role of the medial temporal lobe as a whole for memory formation is well established, much controversy surrounds the precise contributions of the subregions in the medial temporal lobe cortex (MTLC), most notably the perirhinal cortex (PrC) and the parahippocampal cortex (PhC). Although one prominent view links PrC processes with familiarity-based memory and PhC with recollection, an alternative organizing principle is the representational domain critical for successful memory performance (e.g., object- versus scene-related information). In this functional magnetic resonance imaging study, we directly compared successful source encoding during object versus scene imagery, holding perceptual input constant across the two representational domains. Although the hippocampus contributed to associative encoding of both object and scene information, our results revealed a clear double dissociation between PrC and PhC for object- versus scene-related source encoding. In particular, PrC, but not PhC, encoding activation predicted later source memory for the object imagery task, whereas PhC, but not PrC, encoding activation predicted later source memory for the scene imagery task. Interestingly, the transitional zone between PrC and posterior PhC contributed to both object and scene source encoding, possibly reflecting a gradient in domain preference along MTLC. In sum, these results strongly point to representational domain as a key factor determining the involvement of different MTLC subregions during successful episodic memory formation.