RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 Recognition Memory for Objects, Place, and Temporal Order: A Disconnection Analysis of the Role of the Medial Prefrontal Cortex and Perirhinal Cortex
JF The Journal of Neuroscience
JO J. Neurosci.
FD Society for Neuroscience
SP 2948
OP 2957
DO 10.1523/JNEUROSCI.5289-06.2007
VO 27
IS 11
A1 Gareth R. I. Barker
A1 Flora Bird
A1 Victoria Alexander
A1 E. Clea Warburton
YR 2007
UL http://www.jneurosci.org/content/27/11/2948.abstract
AB Recognition memory requires judgments of the previous occurrence of stimuli made on the basis of the relative familiarity of individual objects, or by integrating information concerning objects and location, or by using recency information. The present study examined the role of the medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) and perirhinal cortex (PRH) in these distinct recognition memory processes using a series of behavioral tests: a novel object preference task, an object-in-place task, and a temporal order memory task. Also, a disconnection procedure was used to test whether these regions form components of an integrated system for recognition memory. Male DA rats received bilateral lesions in the PRH or mPFC or unilateral lesions placed in both cortices in either the same (PRH–mPFC IPSI) or contralateral (PRH–mPFC CONTRA) hemispheres. A fifth group underwent sham surgery (SHAM). In the object-in-place and temporal order memory tasks, the PRH, mPFC, and PRH–mPFC CONTRA groups were significantly impaired. However, performance in the novel object preference task was only impaired in the PRH group. No group was impaired in the object location task. These results demonstrate that the mPFC and PRH are crucial for object-in-place associational and recency discriminations, whereas the PRH but not the mPFC is important for the discrimination of novel and familiar individual objects. Importantly, these results provide direct support for the hypothesis that to make discriminations based on associational or recency information, both cortical regions operate within an integrated neural network for recognition memory.