Memory Fields of Neurons in the Primate Prefrontal Cortex

Many prefrontal (PF) neurons convey information about both an object's identity (what) and its location (where). To explore how they represent conjunctions of what and where, we explored the receptive fields of their mnemonic activity (i.e., their ``memory fields'') by requiring monke...

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Published inProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences - PNAS Vol. 95; no. 25; pp. 15008 - 15013
Main Authors Rainer, Gregor, Asaad, Wael F., Miller, Earl K.
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published United States National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 08.12.1998
National Acad Sciences
National Academy of Sciences
The National Academy of Sciences
Subjects
Animal memory
Animals
Behavioral neuroscience
Biological Sciences
Brain
Fovea
Frontal Lobe - physiology
Identity
Memory
Memory - physiology
Mental stimulation
Monkeys
Monkeys & apes
Neurons
Neurons - physiology
Prefrontal cortex
Primates
Social Sciences
Spatial data
Visual fields
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Summary:Many prefrontal (PF) neurons convey information about both an object's identity (what) and its location (where). To explore how they represent conjunctions of what and where, we explored the receptive fields of their mnemonic activity (i.e., their ``memory fields'') by requiring monkeys to remember both an object and its location at many positions throughout a wide portion of central vision. Many PF neurons conveyed object information and had highly localized memory fields that emphasized the contralateral, but not necessarily foveal, visual field. These results indicate that PF neurons can simultaneously convey precise location and object information and thus may play a role in constructing a unified representation of a visual scene.
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To whom reprint requests should be addressed at: Building E25, Room 236, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA 02139. e-mail: ekm@ai.mit.edu.
Communicated by Charles G. Gross, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ
ISSN:0027-8424
1091-6490
DOI:10.1073/pnas.95.25.15008