How does the brain store memories?
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Memory is one of the components of the brain. It helps keep us safe — red stove burners are hot, don’t touch them! — and forms the basis of our identities and stories about our lives.
So how does the brain store memories and retrieve them?
The simplest answer is human brain It changes shape with each new memory. This is caused by synaptic activity, or tiny gaps between brain cells. Brain cells, or neurons, communicate with each other via a sophisticated electrochemical system. A change in the electrical charge of a single cell causes the release of chemicals called neurotransmitters through synapses. The neurotransmitter is taken up by the neuron on the other side of the gap, where it causes electrical changes in that cell.
“Ultimately, memories are encoded in circuits, and synapses are just a vehicle for etching those circuits,” says Don Arnold, a neuroscientist at the University of Southern California. It’s something that sometimes changes in the brain, there’s this new circuit that encodes the memory.”
When one neuron continuously stimulates another, their connections are strengthened. This means that they become more likely to irritate each other over time. When they communicate very little, their bond weakens, and sometimes they don’t communicate at all.At the most basic level, the brain is able to store memories by strengthening connections between networks of neurons. .
Where are memories stored in the brain?
Human memories are stored in several brain regions. The most important is the hippocampus. This is actually a pair of areas deep in the brain that curl up like a seahorse. These paired regions are critical for initial memory formation and play an important role in the transfer of memories from short-term to long-term memory.
Short-term memory lasts only 20-30 seconds before disappearing. For example, you may remember only the time it takes to dial a new phone number, but if you don’t rehearse that number often enough, the neural circuits that formed that short-term memory will stop working together, and you’ll lose memory. fades away. .
When you rehearse or try to memorize information, the hippocampus activates and strengthens the circuitry. Over time, longer-term memories are transferred to the neocortex.The neocortex is the outer, wrinkled part of the brain that is responsible for much of our conscious experience (although nothing is simple in the brain, as his 2017 publication in the journal study of the year chemistry We discovered that some remnants of these long-term memories are also lodged in the hippocampus. )
An almond-shaped region of the human brain, the amygdala helps process emotions such as fear and also plays a role in memory.In a study published in March in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of SciencesArnold and colleagues found that when fish learn to associate light with painful sensations, they develop new synapses in one part of the brain region called the pallium and lose synapses in another part of the pallium. The pallium is similar to the amygdala, and the part of the fish mantle that the study has strengthened synapses in is full of neurons involved in processing painful stimuli, whereas fish process positive or neutral stimuli. You’ve lost synapses between neurons, Arnold said.
Emotions are a key component of memory formation, says Avishek Adhikari, a neuroscientist at the University of California, Los Angeles. Both positive and negative emotional situations are remembered better than neutral events. This is probably for survival.
Adhikari told Live Science that high-emotion scenarios release high concentrations of certain neurotransmitters, and the presence of these neurotransmitters may enhance memory circuits in the hippocampus.
Other areas involved in memory include the basal ganglia and the cerebellum, which process the motor memories needed to play piano pieces, for example. The prefrontal cortex assists with “working memory,” which is involved when information needs to be retained. In your head long enough to work with it, for example when solving a math problem, According to the University of Queensland.
mystery of memory
The formation of new neurons plays an important role in memory storage, even in the adult brain. Scientists thought that the brain stopped producing new neurons after puberty, but research over the past two decades has shown The adult brain makes new neurons, but these neurons are key to learning and memory.2019 study in the journal cell stem cell We found that the hippocampus continues to generate new neurons, even in people in their 80s and 90s.
Observing memory formation and processing in the working brain is difficult. Synapses are small and numerous (the adult brain has about a trillion) and are difficult to image beyond the surface of the brain, Arnold tells his Live Science. Imaging methods should also not interfere with brain function. But new technologies are enabling new discoveries. For example, to peer into zebrafish brains while learning to associate flashing lights with unpleasant sensations, Arnold and his colleagues modified the fish’s genome to display fluorescent proteins at synapses. It has changed. Researchers can then use specialized microscopes to take images of these synapses and monitor changes.
Understanding how memory works is important to advance treatments for diseases like Alzheimer’s that cause memory loss. Understanding some of the quirks of memory can also help improve your memory. For example, the hippocampus is involved not only in consolidating memories, but also in navigating places. This makes sense given the importance of remembering where you were and where you were when trying to move.. , like remembering pi to tens of thousands of digits, the hippocampus It often does so by borrowing the spatial memory abilities of . They mentally associate each item they want to remember with a location in a fictional place. memory palaceBy visualizing this place, the person practicing this technique can recall a great deal of information.
“It’s very strange, but the reason it works is that the hippocampus is particularly good at mapping spatial routes,” says Adhikari. Originally published in Live Science.
Originally published in Live Science.
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