Prefrontal cortex and neural mechanisms of executive function
Publication date: December 2013 Source:Journal of Physiology-Paris, Volume 107, Issue 6 Author(s): Shintaro Funahashi , Jorge Mario Andreau Executive function is a product of the coordinated operation of multiple neural systems and an essential prerequisite for a variety of cognitive functions. The prefrontal cortex is known to be a key structure for the performance of executive functions. To accomplish the coordinated operations of multiple neural systems, the prefrontal cortex must monitor the activities in other cortical and subcortical structures and control and supervise their operations by sending command signa...
Source: Journal of Physiology Paris - October 12, 2014 Category: Physiology Source Type: research
Diverse synchrony of firing reflects diverse cell-assembly coding in the prefrontal cortex
Publication date: December 2013 Source:Journal of Physiology-Paris, Volume 107, Issue 6 Author(s): Yoshio Sakurai , Tomoaki Nakazono , Seiya Ishino , Satoshi Terada , Kenji Yamaguchi , Susumu Takahashi In the present paper, we focus on the coding by cell assemblies in the prefrontal cortex (PFC) and discuss the diversity of the coding, which results in stable and dynamic representations and the processing of various information in that higher brain region. The key activity that reflects cell-assembly coding is the synchrony of the firing of multiple neurons when animals are performing cognitive and memory tasks. ...
Source: Journal of Physiology Paris - October 12, 2014 Category: Physiology Source Type: research
Distributed neural networks of tactile working memory
Publication date: December 2013 Source:Journal of Physiology-Paris, Volume 107, Issue 6 Author(s): Liping Wang , Mark Bodner , Yong-Di Zhou Microelectrode recordings of cortical activity in primates performing working memory tasks reveal some cortical neurons exhibiting sustained or graded persistent elevations in firing rate during the period in which sensory information is actively maintained in short-term memory. These neurons are called “memory cells”. Imaging and transcranial magnetic stimulation studies indicate that memory cells may arise from distributed cortical networks. Depending on the sensory modali...
Source: Journal of Physiology Paris - October 12, 2014 Category: Physiology Source Type: research
The effect of non-competitive NMDA receptor antagonist MK-801 on neuronal activity in rodent prefrontal cortex: an animal model for cognitive symptoms of schizophrenia
Publication date: December 2013 Source:Journal of Physiology-Paris, Volume 107, Issue 6 Author(s): Kevin Blot , Jing Bai , Satoru Otani Schizophrenia affects about 1% of the world population and is a major socio-economical problem in ours societies. Cognitive symptoms are particularly resistant to current treatments and are believed to be closely related to an altered function of prefrontal cortex (PFC). Particularly, abnormalities in the plasticity processes in the PFC are a candidate mechanism underlying cognitive symptoms, and the recent evidences in patients are in line with this hypothesis. Animal pharmacologic...
Source: Journal of Physiology Paris - October 12, 2014 Category: Physiology Source Type: research
Functional structure of the intermediate and ventral hippocampo–prefrontal pathway in the prefrontal convergent system
Publication date: December 2013 Source:Journal of Physiology-Paris, Volume 107, Issue 6 Author(s): Masatoshi Takita , Sei-Etsu Fujiwara , Yoshinori Izaki The hippocampo–prefrontal pathway is a unique projection that connects distant ends of the cerebral cortex. The direct hippocampo–prefrontal projection arises from the ventral to intermediate third of the hippocampus, but not from the dorsal third. It forms a funnel-shaped structure that collects information from the large hippocampal area and projects it to the prefrontal cortex. The anatomical regional differentiation of the projection has not been described....
Source: Journal of Physiology Paris - October 12, 2014 Category: Physiology Source Type: research
The role of the hippocampo-prefrontal cortex system in phencyclidine-induced psychosis: A model for schizophrenia
Publication date: December 2013 Source:Journal of Physiology-Paris, Volume 107, Issue 6 Author(s): Eiichi Jodo Phencyclidine (PCP) is a psychotomimetic drug that induces schizophrenia-like symptoms in healthy individuals and exacerbates pre-existing symptoms in patients with schizophrenia. PCP also induces behavioral and cognitive abnormalities in non-human animals, and PCP-treated animals are considered a reliable pharmacological model of schizophrenia. However, the exact neural mechanisms by which PCP modulates behavior are not known. During the last decade several studies have indicated that disturbed activity of t...
Source: Journal of Physiology Paris - October 12, 2014 Category: Physiology Source Type: research
Cognitive-motor brain–machine interfaces
Publication date: February 2014 Source:Journal of Physiology-Paris, Volume 108, Issue 1 Author(s): Ariel Tankus , Itzhak Fried , Shy Shoham Brain–machine interfaces (BMIs) open new horizons for the treatment of paralyzed persons, giving hope for the artificial restoration of lost physiological functions. Whereas BMI development has mainly focused on motor rehabilitation, recent studies have suggested that higher cognitive functions can also be deciphered from brain activity, bypassing low level planning and execution functions, and replacing them by computer-controlled effectors. This review describes the new gene...
Source: Journal of Physiology Paris - October 12, 2014 Category: Physiology Source Type: research
A biologically inspired hierarchical goal directed navigation model
Publication date: February 2014 Source:Journal of Physiology-Paris, Volume 108, Issue 1 Author(s): Uğur M. Erdem , Michael E. Hasselmo We propose an extended version of our previous goal directed navigation model based on forward planning of trajectories in a network of head direction cells, persistent spiking cells, grid cells, and place cells. In our original work the animat incrementally creates a place cell map by random exploration of a novel environment. After the exploration phase, the animat decides on its next movement direction towards a goal by probing linear look-ahead trajectories in several candidate d...
Source: Journal of Physiology Paris - October 12, 2014 Category: Physiology Source Type: research
Coding and decoding with dendrites
Publication date: February 2014 Source:Journal of Physiology-Paris, Volume 108, Issue 1 Author(s): Athanasia Papoutsi , George Kastellakis , Maria Psarrou , Stelios Anastasakis , Panayiota Poirazi Since the discovery of complex, voltage dependent mechanisms in the dendrites of multiple neuron types, great effort has been devoted in search of a direct link between dendritic properties and specific neuronal functions. Over the last few years, new experimental techniques have allowed the visualization and probing of dendritic anatomy, plasticity and integrative schemes with unprecedented detail. This vast amount of i...
Source: Journal of Physiology Paris - October 12, 2014 Category: Physiology Source Type: research
Latency of chromatic information in area V4
Publication date: February 2014 Source:Journal of Physiology-Paris, Volume 108, Issue 1 Author(s): Mindy Chang , Sherry Xian , Jonathan Rubin , Tirin Moore In the primate visual system, information about color is known to be carried in separate divisions of the retino-geniculo-cortical pathway. From the retina, responses of photoreceptors to short (S), medium (M), and long (L) wavelengths of light are processed in two different opponent pathways. Signals in the S-opponent pathway, or blue/yellow channel, have been found to lag behind signals in the L/M-opponent pathway, or red/green channel in primary visual area V...
Source: Journal of Physiology Paris - October 12, 2014 Category: Physiology Source Type: research
Mapping the primate lateral geniculate nucleus: A review of experiments and methods
Publication date: February 2014 Source:Journal of Physiology-Paris, Volume 108, Issue 1 Author(s): Ailsa M. Jeffries , Nathaniel J. Killian , John S. Pezaris Mapping neuronal responses in the lateral geniculate nucleus (LGN) is key to understanding how visual information is processed in the brain. This paper focuses on our current knowledge of the dynamics the receptive field (RF) as broken down into the classical receptive field (CRF) and the extra-classical receptive field (ECRF) in primate LGN. CRFs in the LGN are known to be similar to those in the retinal ganglion cell layer in terms of both spatial and tempora...
Source: Journal of Physiology Paris - October 12, 2014 Category: Physiology Source Type: research
The actual and the possible
Publication date: February 2014 Source:Journal of Physiology-Paris, Volume 108, Issue 1 Author(s): Kenneth I. Blum (Source: Journal of Physiology Paris)
Source: Journal of Physiology Paris - October 12, 2014 Category: Physiology Source Type: research
Role of PFC during retrieval of recognition memory in rodents
Publication date: Available online 12 April 2014 Source:Journal of Physiology-Paris Author(s): Pedro Bekinschtein , Noelia Weisstaub One of the challenges for memory researches is the study of the neurobiology of episodic memory which is defined by the integration of all the different components of experiences that support the conscious recollection of events. The features of episodic memory includes a particular object or person (“what”), the context in which the experience took place (“where”) and the particular time at which the event occurred (“when”). Although episodic memory has been mainly studied ...
Source: Journal of Physiology Paris - October 12, 2014 Category: Physiology Source Type: research
Maternal and affective behaviors of lactating rats reared in overlapping litters
Publication date: Available online 16 April 2014 Source:Journal of Physiology-Paris Author(s): Natalia Uriarte , María Victoria Fernández , Daniella Agrati , María José Zuluaga , Marcela Ferreño , Annabel Ferreira Postpartum mating in rats gives rise to complex family units consisting of the mother and two overlapping litters. As a consequence, newborn pups of the second litter, since the moment they are born, acquire experience not only from interaction with the mother and age-matched littermates but also from interaction with older siblings. Newborn pups reared in overlapping litters (OLs) receive a differ...
Source: Journal of Physiology Paris - October 12, 2014 Category: Physiology Source Type: research
Characterization of reward and effort mechanisms in apathy
Publication date: Available online 18 April 2014 Source:Journal of Physiology-Paris Author(s): Valerie Bonnelle , Kai-Riin Veromann , Stephanie Burnett Heyes , Elena Lo Sterzo , Sanjay Manohar , Masud Husain Apathy is a common but poorly understood condition with a wide societal impact observed in several brain disorders as well as, to some extent, in the normal population. Hence the need for better characterization of the underlying mechanisms. The processes by which individuals decide to attribute physical effort to obtain rewards might be particularly relevant to relate to apathy traits. Here, we designed two ...
Source: Journal of Physiology Paris - October 12, 2014 Category: Physiology Source Type: research
