Neurophysiological studies of working memory in the primate prefrontal and parietal cortex

old_uid5438
titleNeurophysiological studies of working memory in the primate prefrontal and parietal cortex
start_date2008/10/21
schedule11h30
onlineno
location_infosalle de réunion
detailsInvité par Emmanuel PROCYK
summaryThe primate prefrontal cortex is important in cognitive functions such as working memory and selective attention. Previous neurophysiological studies in non-human primates have uncovered neural correlates of these functions during the execution of numerous behavioral tasks. Much less is known about how the organization of the prefrontal cortex is modified by learning so as to mediate performance of the task. In order to address this question, we conducted neurophysiological experiments in monkeys before and after they were trained to perform a cognitive task. The task required them to attend to and remember visual stimuli, and perform a categorical decision on whether two stimuli presented in sequence were the same or different. Our results revealed a systematic organization of neuronal responses in terms of stimulus locations and features, as well as persistent discharges prior to any training. This organization remained essentially unaltered following the several-month-long training period. However, subtle changes in the selectivity and magnitude of neuronal responses were observed after training.
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