FLICKR, NIH IMAGE GALLERYNeuroscientists have long tried to uncover the neuronal connectivity and patterns of activity that explain human cognitive behaviors. The prevalent theory of working memory—using information stored in short-term memory to complete a task—is that the brain’s connections that code for the needed information must fire continuously. Now, in a paper published today (December 1) in Science, researchers from the University of Wisconsin–Madison and their colleagues provide evidence for a different theory, in which information can be stored in working memory in an inactive neuronal state. The team’s results suggest that there are multiple ways our brains store short- and longer-term memories, depending on expectations of when that information is likely to be needed.
“There has been a line of research suggesting there may be more to working memory than activated neurons,” said Nelson Cowan who studies working memory at the University of Missouri and was not involved in the current work. “This study has made an exciting headway towards supporting this newer theory.”
“A great deal of behavioral working memory research measures how much information can be briefly stored in working memory. This work suggests that there exists extra information in a ‘hidden’ or ‘latent’ state that may be missed by these measures,” Tommy Sprague, a postdoctoral fellow at New York University who also was not involved in the study, wrote in an email to The Scientist.
In prior work, Bradley Postle and colleagues had already hinted that ...
