Stimulation of the human medial temporal lobe between learning and recall selectively enhances forgetting.

Authors

• Maxwell B Merkow
• John F Burke
• Ashwin G Ramayya
• Ashwini D Sharan
• Michael R Sperling
• Michael J Kahana

Publication/Presentation Date

1-1-2017

Abstract

BACKGROUND: Direct electrical stimulation applied to the human medial temporal lobe (MTL) typically disrupts performance on memory tasks, however, the mechanism underlying this effect is not known.

OBJECTIVE: To study the effects of MTL stimulation on memory performance.

METHODS: We studied the effects of MTL stimulation on memory in five patients undergoing invasive electrocorticographic monitoring during various phases of a memory task (encoding, distractor, recall).

RESULTS: We found that MTL stimulation disrupted memory performance in a timing-dependent manner; we observed greater forgetting when applying stimulation during the delay between encoding and recall, compared to when it was applied during encoding or recall.

CONCLUSIONS: The results suggest that recall is most dependent on the MTL between learning and retrieval.

Volume

10

Issue

3

First Page

645

Last Page

650

ISSN

1876-4754

Published In/Presented At

Merkow, M. B., Burke, J. F., Ramayya, A. G., Sharan, A. D., Sperling, M. R., & Kahana, M. J. (2017). Stimulation of the human medial temporal lobe between learning and recall selectively enhances forgetting. Brain stimulation, 10(3), 645–650. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.brs.2016.12.011

Disciplines

Medicine and Health Sciences

PubMedID

28073638

Department(s)

Department of Medicine

Document Type

Article