Neural Plasticity and Memory : From Genes to Brain Imaging

This latest offering in the Frontiers in Neuroscience series provides a multidisciplinary review of research being conducted on the neurobiology of memory. This volume examines the synaptic communication elements identified as being susceptible to modification through the accumulation of experience. It explains how cell circuitry is modulated and ultimately modified by neurotransmitters and hormones during the process of acquiring, consolidating, and retrieving information. In each chapter, researchers present findings, while explaining their innovative methodologies. This text also addresses current memory studies involving human brain imaging.

A comprehensive, multidisciplinary review, Neural Plasticity and Memory: From Genes to Brain Imaging provides an in-depth, up-to-date analysis of the study of the neurobiology of memory. Leading specialists share their scientific experience in the field, covering a wide range of topics where molecular, genetic, behavioral, and brain imaging techniques have been used to investigate how cellular and brain circuits may be modified by experience. In each chapter, researchers present findings and explain their innovative methodologies.

The book begins by introducing key issues and providing a historical overview of the field of memory consolidation. The following chapters review the putative genetic and molecular mechanisms of cell plasticity, elaborating on how experience could induce gene and protein expression and describing their role in synaptic plasticity underlying memory formation. They explore how putative modifications of brain circuits and synaptic elements through experience can become relatively permanent and hence improve brain function.

Interdisciplinary reviews focus on how nerve cell circuitry, molecular expression, neurotransmitter release, and electrical activity are modified during the acquisition and consolidation of long-term memory. The book also covers receptor activation/deactivation by different neurotransmitters that enable the intracellular activation of second messengers during memory formation. It concludes with a summary of current research on the modulation and regulation that different neurotransmitters and stress hormones have on formation and consolidation of memory.