Charlotte Boccara

Title:

Hippocampal and Cortical Dynamics across Learning and Development

Abstract:

This talk is about cortico-hippocampal dynamics occurring during sleep both in development and during learning. Making memories can be described as a two-step process. Step one is the learning – or encoding of new information in a temporary storage – the hippocampus . The information can be completely new or can be a modified new version of an already stored mnemonic trace. Step two is the consolidation of such newly learnt information and their transfer into a long-term storage in the cortex, where it will be accessible for later recall if a need arises. Such transfer of information is thought to heavily relies on a good dialogue between the hippocampus and the cortex, especially during sleep. While the two-stage memory model is widely recognized, we have very little data on (i) what mechanisms support information update, (ii) how and when the hippocampo-cortical dialogue happens and (iii) how it affects the memory neural code. To finally bridge this important knowledge gap, we have concomitantly recorded from the CA1 region of the hippocampus and the medial entorhinal cortex of rats while they learn new goal locations, sleep and have their memory tested after.