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Rodent mnemonic similarity task performance requires the prefrontal cortex.

Sarah A Johnson^1,2, Sabrina Zequeira^1,2, Sean M Turner³

¹Evelyn F. and William L. McKnight Brain Institute, Gainesville, Florida, USA.

|February 19, 2021

Summary

This summary is machine-generated.

The prefrontal cortex (PFC) is crucial for distinguishing similar memories, even when stimuli become familiar. Inactivating the PFC impairs this ability regardless of memory familiarity, unlike the hippocampus.

Keywords:

aging infralimbic cortex medial temporal lobe muscimol object recognition prelimbic cortex

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Area of Science:

Neuroscience
Cognitive Neuroscience
Aging Research

Background:

Mnemonic discrimination, distinguishing targets from similar lures, relies on the hippocampus and perirhinal cortex.
Aging impairs mnemonic discrimination, with hippocampal disruption affecting novel but not familiar lure discrimination.
The medial prefrontal cortex (PFC) is implicated in memory retrieval and executive functions, and is vulnerable to aging.

Purpose of the Study:

To investigate the role of the medial prefrontal cortex (PFC) in mnemonic similarity task performance.
To determine if PFC inactivation affects mnemonic discrimination regardless of stimulus novelty or familiarity.

Main Methods:

Rats were trained on an object-based mnemonic similarity task.
Rats received infusions of muscimol (GABA_A agonist) into the medial PFC to inactivate neuronal activity.
Neuronal inactivation in prelimbic and infralimbic cortices was confirmed via Arc expression analysis.

Main Results:

PFC inactivation significantly impaired mnemonic discrimination performance across all testing blocks.
Discrimination deficits occurred regardless of lure novelty or familiarity, contrasting with hippocampal effects.
PFC inactivation impaired performance when lures shared 50-90% feature overlap with the target.

Conclusions:

The prefrontal cortex (PFC) plays a critical role in mnemonic similarity task performance.
PFC involvement in mnemonic discrimination is dissociable from the hippocampus's time course.
The PFC supports mnemonic discrimination irrespective of whether stimuli are novel or familiar.