Direct recordings of grid-like neuronal activity in human spatial navigation

• Published in: Nature neuroscience Vol. 16; no. 9; pp. 1188 - 1190
• Main Authors: Jacobs, Joshua, Weidemann, Christoph T, Miller, Jonathan F, Solway, Alec, Burke, John F, Wei, Xue-Xin, Suthana, Nanthia, Sperling, Michael R, Sharan, Ashwini D, Fried, Itzhak, Kahana, Michael J
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: New York Nature Publishing Group US 01.09.2013; Nature Publishing Group
• Subjects: 631/378/1595; 631/378/2629/2630; Action Potentials - physiology; Animal Genetics and Genomics; Animals; Behavioral Sciences; Biological Techniques; Biomedicine; Brain Mapping; brief-communication; Entorhinal Cortex - cytology; Entorhinal Cortex - diagnostic imaging; Entorhinal Cortex - pathology; Epilepsy; Epilepsy - pathology; Epilepsy - surgery; Hippocampus (Brain); Humans; Image Processing, Computer-Assisted; Magnetic Resonance Imaging; Models, Neurological; Movement; Neural recording; Neurobiology; Neurons; Neurons - physiology; Neurosciences; Neurosurgery; Properties; Recording equipment; Space Perception - physiology; Spatial behavior; Spatial Behavior - physiology; Tomography, X-Ray Computed; User-Computer Interface; United States; United States > US; California; Pennsylvania
• ISSN: 1097-6256; 1546-1726; 1546-1726
• DOI: 10.1038/nn.3466

Grid cell activity in the rodent and non-human primate entorhinal cortex is thought to provide spatial location information to the hippocampus for navigation and spatial processing. Here, Jacobs et al . examined single neuron spiking activities from human subjects performing a virtual spatial navigation task and show the presence of grid-like firing activity. Grid cells in the entorhinal cortex appear to represent spatial location via a triangular coordinate system. Such cells, which have been identified in rats, bats and monkeys, are believed to support a wide range of spatial behaviors. Recording neuronal activity from neurosurgical patients performing a virtual-navigation task, we identified cells exhibiting grid-like spiking patterns in the human brain, suggesting that humans and simpler animals rely on homologous spatial-coding schemes.