1
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Lee S, Rutishauser U, Gothard KM. Social status as a latent variable in the amygdala of observers of social interactions. Neuron 2024:S0896-6273(24)00658-5. [PMID: 39389051 DOI: 10.1016/j.neuron.2024.09.010] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/03/2024] [Revised: 08/12/2024] [Accepted: 09/10/2024] [Indexed: 10/12/2024]
Abstract
Successful integration into a hierarchical social group requires knowledge of the status of each individual and of the rules that govern social interactions within the group. In species that lack morphological indicators of status, social status can be inferred by observing the signals exchanged between individuals. We simulated social interactions between macaques by juxtaposing videos of aggressive and appeasing displays, where two individuals appeared in each other's line of sight and their displays were timed to suggest the reciprocation of dominant and subordinate signals. Viewers of these videos successfully inferred the social status of the interacting characters. Dominant individuals attracted more social attention from viewers even when they were not engaged in social displays. Neurons in the viewers' amygdala signaled the status of both the attended (fixated) and the unattended individuals, suggesting that in third-party observers of social interactions, the amygdala jointly signals the status of interacting parties.
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Affiliation(s)
- SeungHyun Lee
- Department of Neurosurgery, Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA 02114, USA; Department of Physiology, College of Medicine, The University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ 85721, USA
| | - Ueli Rutishauser
- Department of Neurosurgery, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA 90048, USA; Computation and Neural Systems, Division of Biology and Biological Engineering, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA 91125, USA
| | - Katalin M Gothard
- Department of Physiology, College of Medicine, The University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ 85721, USA.
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2
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Lee S, Rutishauser U, Gothard KM. Social Status as a Latent Variable in the Amygdala of Observers of Social Interactions. BIORXIV : THE PREPRINT SERVER FOR BIOLOGY 2024:2024.07.15.603487. [PMID: 39071330 PMCID: PMC11275939 DOI: 10.1101/2024.07.15.603487] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 07/30/2024]
Abstract
Successful integration into a hierarchical social group requires knowledge of the status of each individual and of the rules that govern social interactions within the group. In species that lack morphological indicators of status, social status can be inferred by observing the signals exchanged between individuals. We simulated social interactions between macaques by juxtaposing videos of aggressive and appeasing displays where two individuals appeared in each other's line of sight and their displays were timed to suggest the reciprocation of dominant and subordinate signals. Viewers of these videos successfully inferred the social status of the interacting characters. Dominant individuals attracted more social attention from viewers even when they were not engaged in social displays. Neurons in the viewers' amygdala signaled the status of both the attended (fixated) and the unattended individuals suggesting that in third party observers of social interactions, the amygdala signals jointly the status of interacting parties. Highlights Monkeys infer the social status of conspecifics from videos of simulated dyadic interactionsDuring fixations neural populations signal the social status of the attended individualsNeurons in the amygdala jointly encode the status of interacting individuals. In brief Third party-viewers of pairwise dominant-subordinate interactions infer social status from the observed behaviors. Neurons in the amygdala are tuned to the inferred dominant/subordinate status of both individuals.
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3
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Lee S, Williams ZM. Role of Prefrontal Cortex Circuitry in Maintaining Social Homeostasis. Biol Psychiatry 2024:S0006-3223(24)01455-0. [PMID: 39019390 DOI: 10.1016/j.biopsych.2024.07.007] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/12/2024] [Revised: 06/12/2024] [Accepted: 07/11/2024] [Indexed: 07/19/2024]
Abstract
Homeostasis is a fundamental concept in biology and ensures the stability of life by maintaining the constancy of physiological processes. Recent years have witnessed a surge in research interest in these physiological processes, with a growing focus on understanding the mechanisms underlying social homeostasis. This shift in focus underscores our increasing understanding of the importance of social interactions and their impact on individual well-being. In this review, we explore the interconnected research across 3 primary categories: understanding the neural mechanisms influencing set points, defining contemporary factors that can disrupt social homeostasis, and identifying the potential contributions of social homeostatic failure in the development of psychiatric diseases. We also delve into the role of the prefrontal cortex and its circuitry in regulating social behavior, decision-making processes, and the manifestation of neuropsychiatric disorders, such as depression and anxiety. Finally, we examine the influence of more recent factors such as growing social media exposure and the COVID-19 pandemic on mental health, highlighting their disruptive effects. We also identify gaps in current literature through the analysis of research trends and propose future research directions to advance our understanding of social homeostasis, with implications for mental health interventions.
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Affiliation(s)
- SeungHyun Lee
- Department of Neurosurgery, Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts
| | - Ziv M Williams
- Department of Neurosurgery, Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts; Harvard-MIT Division of Health Sciences and Technology, Boston, Massachusetts; Program in Neuroscience, Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts.
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4
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Aquino TG, Courellis H, Mamelak AN, Rutishauser U, O Doherty JP. Encoding of Predictive Associations in Human Prefrontal and Medial Temporal Neurons During Pavlovian Appetitive Conditioning. J Neurosci 2024; 44:e1628232024. [PMID: 38423764 PMCID: PMC11044193 DOI: 10.1523/jneurosci.1628-23.2024] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/28/2023] [Revised: 01/29/2024] [Accepted: 02/19/2024] [Indexed: 03/02/2024] Open
Abstract
Pavlovian conditioning is thought to involve the formation of learned associations between stimuli and values, and between stimuli and specific features of outcomes. Here, we leveraged human single neuron recordings in ventromedial prefrontal, dorsomedial frontal, hippocampus, and amygdala while patients of both sexes performed an appetitive Pavlovian conditioning task probing both stimulus-value and stimulus-stimulus associations. Ventromedial prefrontal cortex encoded predictive value along with the amygdala, and also encoded predictions about the identity of stimuli that would subsequently be presented, suggesting a role for neurons in this region in encoding predictive information beyond value. Unsigned error signals were found in dorsomedial frontal areas and hippocampus, potentially supporting learning of non-value related outcome features. Our findings implicate distinct human prefrontal and medial temporal neuronal populations in mediating predictive associations which could partially support model-based mechanisms during Pavlovian conditioning.
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Affiliation(s)
- Tomas G Aquino
- Department of Neurosurgery, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, California 90048
- Computation and Neural Systems, Division of Biology and Biological Engineering, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, California 91125
| | - Hristos Courellis
- Biological Engineering, Division of Biology and Biological Engineering, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, California 91125
| | - Adam N Mamelak
- Department of Neurosurgery, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, California 90048
| | - Ueli Rutishauser
- Department of Neurosurgery, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, California 90048
- Computation and Neural Systems, Division of Biology and Biological Engineering, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, California 91125
| | - John P O Doherty
- Computation and Neural Systems, Division of Biology and Biological Engineering, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, California 91125
- Division of Humanities and Social Sciences, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, California 91125
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5
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Wang Y, Cao R, Wang S. Encoding of Visual Objects in the Human Medial Temporal Lobe. J Neurosci 2024; 44:e2135232024. [PMID: 38429107 PMCID: PMC11026346 DOI: 10.1523/jneurosci.2135-23.2024] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/14/2023] [Revised: 02/10/2024] [Accepted: 02/25/2024] [Indexed: 03/03/2024] Open
Abstract
The human medial temporal lobe (MTL) plays a crucial role in recognizing visual objects, a key cognitive function that relies on the formation of semantic representations. Nonetheless, it remains unknown how visual information of general objects is translated into semantic representations in the MTL. Furthermore, the debate about whether the human MTL is involved in perception has endured for a long time. To address these questions, we investigated three distinct models of neural object coding-semantic coding, axis-based feature coding, and region-based feature coding-in each subregion of the human MTL, using high-resolution fMRI in two male and six female participants. Our findings revealed the presence of semantic coding throughout the MTL, with a higher prevalence observed in the parahippocampal cortex (PHC) and perirhinal cortex (PRC), while axis coding and region coding were primarily observed in the earlier regions of the MTL. Moreover, we demonstrated that voxels exhibiting axis coding supported the transition to region coding and contained information relevant to semantic coding. Together, by providing a detailed characterization of neural object coding schemes and offering a comprehensive summary of visual coding information for each MTL subregion, our results not only emphasize a clear role of the MTL in perceptual processing but also shed light on the translation of perception-driven representations of visual features into memory-driven representations of semantics along the MTL processing pathway.
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Affiliation(s)
- Yue Wang
- Department of Radiology, Washington University in St. Louis, St. Louis, Missouri 63110
| | - Runnan Cao
- Department of Radiology, Washington University in St. Louis, St. Louis, Missouri 63110
| | - Shuo Wang
- Department of Radiology, Washington University in St. Louis, St. Louis, Missouri 63110
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6
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Schonhaut DR, Rao AM, Ramayya AG, Solomon EA, Herweg NA, Fried I, Kahana MJ. MTL neurons phase-lock to human hippocampal theta. eLife 2024; 13:e85753. [PMID: 38193826 PMCID: PMC10948143 DOI: 10.7554/elife.85753] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/22/2022] [Accepted: 01/08/2024] [Indexed: 01/10/2024] Open
Abstract
Memory formation depends on neural activity across a network of regions, including the hippocampus and broader medial temporal lobe (MTL). Interactions between these regions have been studied indirectly using functional MRI, but the bases for interregional communication at a cellular level remain poorly understood. Here, we evaluate the hypothesis that oscillatory currents in the hippocampus synchronize the firing of neurons both within and outside the hippocampus. We recorded extracellular spikes from 1854 single- and multi-units simultaneously with hippocampal local field potentials (LFPs) in 28 neurosurgical patients who completed virtual navigation experiments. A majority of hippocampal neurons phase-locked to oscillations in the slow (2-4 Hz) or fast (6-10 Hz) theta bands, with a significant subset exhibiting nested slow theta × beta frequency (13-20 Hz) phase-locking. Outside of the hippocampus, phase-locking to hippocampal oscillations occurred only at theta frequencies and primarily among neurons in the entorhinal cortex and amygdala. Moreover, extrahippocampal neurons phase-locked to hippocampal theta even when theta did not appear locally. These results indicate that spike-time synchronization with hippocampal theta is a defining feature of neuronal activity in the hippocampus and structurally connected MTL regions. Theta phase-locking could mediate flexible communication with the hippocampus to influence the content and quality of memories.
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Affiliation(s)
- Daniel R Schonhaut
- Department of Neuroscience, Perelman School of Medicine, University of PennsylvaniaPhiladelphiaUnited States
| | - Aditya M Rao
- Department of Psychology, University of PennsylvaniaPhiladelphiaUnited States
| | - Ashwin G Ramayya
- Department of Neurosurgery, University of PennsylvaniaPhiladelphiaUnited States
| | - Ethan A Solomon
- Department of Bioengineering, University of PennsylvaniaPhiladelphiaUnited States
| | - Nora A Herweg
- Department of Psychology, University of PennsylvaniaPhiladelphiaUnited States
| | - Itzhak Fried
- Department of Neurosurgery, Neurosurgery, David Geffen School of Medicine and Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior, University of California, Los AngelesLos AngelesUnited States
- Faculty of Medicine, Tel-Aviv UniversityTel-AvivIsrael
| | - Michael J Kahana
- Department of Psychology, University of PennsylvaniaPhiladelphiaUnited States
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7
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Tyree TJ, Metke M, Miller CT. Cross-modal representation of identity in the primate hippocampus. Science 2023; 382:417-423. [PMID: 37883535 PMCID: PMC11086670 DOI: 10.1126/science.adf0460] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/25/2022] [Accepted: 09/01/2023] [Indexed: 10/28/2023]
Abstract
Faces and voices are the dominant social signals used to recognize individuals among primates. Yet, it is not known how these signals are integrated into a cross-modal representation of individual identity in the primate brain. We discovered that, although single neurons in the marmoset hippocampus exhibited selective responses when presented with the face or voice of a specific individual, a parallel mechanism for representing the cross-modal identities for multiple individuals was evident within single neurons and at the population level. Manifold projections likewise showed the separability of individuals as well as clustering for others' families, which suggests that multiple learned social categories are encoded as related dimensions of identity in the hippocampus. Neural representations of identity in the hippocampus are thus both modality independent and reflect the primate social network.
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Affiliation(s)
- Timothy J Tyree
- Cortical Systems and Behavior Laboratory, University of California San Diego; 9500 Gilman Dr. La Jolla, CA 92039, USA
- Department of Physics, University of California San Diego; 9500 Gilman Dr. La Jolla, CA 92039, USA
| | - Michael Metke
- Cortical Systems and Behavior Laboratory, University of California San Diego; 9500 Gilman Dr. La Jolla, CA 92039, USA
- Neurosciences Graduate Program, University of California San Diego; 9500 Gilman Dr. La Jolla, CA 92039, USA
| | - Cory T Miller
- Cortical Systems and Behavior Laboratory, University of California San Diego; 9500 Gilman Dr. La Jolla, CA 92039, USA
- Neurosciences Graduate Program, University of California San Diego; 9500 Gilman Dr. La Jolla, CA 92039, USA
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8
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Putnam PT, Chu CCJ, Fagan NA, Dal Monte O, Chang SWC. Dissociation of vicarious and experienced rewards by coupling frequency within the same neural pathway. Neuron 2023; 111:2513-2522.e4. [PMID: 37348507 PMCID: PMC10527039 DOI: 10.1016/j.neuron.2023.05.020] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/05/2023] [Revised: 04/05/2023] [Accepted: 05/24/2023] [Indexed: 06/24/2023]
Abstract
Vicarious reward, essential to social learning and decision making, is theorized to engage select brain regions similarly to experienced reward to generate a shared experience. However, it is just as important for neural systems to also differentiate vicarious from experienced rewards for social interaction. Here, we investigated the neuronal interaction between the primate anterior cingulate cortex gyrus (ACCg) and the basolateral amygdala (BLA) when social choices made by monkeys led to either vicarious or experienced reward. Coherence between ACCg spikes and BLA local field potential (LFP) selectively increased in gamma frequencies for vicarious reward, whereas it selectively increased in alpha/beta frequencies for experienced reward. These respectively enhanced couplings for vicarious and experienced rewards were uniquely observed following voluntary choices. Moreover, reward outcomes had consistently strong directional influences from ACCg to BLA. Our findings support a mechanism of vicarious reward where social agency is tagged by interareal coordination frequency within the same shared pathway.
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Affiliation(s)
- Philip T Putnam
- Department of Psychology, Yale University, New Haven, CT 06511, USA
| | - Cheng-Chi J Chu
- Department of Psychology, Yale University, New Haven, CT 06511, USA
| | - Nicholas A Fagan
- Department of Psychology, Yale University, New Haven, CT 06511, USA
| | - Olga Dal Monte
- Department of Psychology, Yale University, New Haven, CT 06511, USA; Department of Psychology, University of Turin, Torino, Italy
| | - Steve W C Chang
- Department of Psychology, Yale University, New Haven, CT 06511, USA; Department of Neuroscience, Yale University School of Medicine, New Haven, CT 06510, USA; Kavli Institute for Neuroscience, Yale University School of Medicine, New Haven, CT 06510, USA; Wu Tsai Institute, Yale University, New Haven, CT 06510, USA.
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9
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Donoghue T, Cao R, Han CZ, Holman CM, Brandmeir NJ, Wang S, Jacobs J. Single neurons in the human medial temporal lobe flexibly shift representations across spatial and memory tasks. Hippocampus 2023; 33:600-615. [PMID: 37060325 PMCID: PMC10231142 DOI: 10.1002/hipo.23539] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/19/2023] [Revised: 03/17/2023] [Accepted: 03/21/2023] [Indexed: 04/16/2023]
Abstract
Investigations into how individual neurons encode behavioral variables of interest have revealed specific representations in single neurons, such as place and object cells, as well as a wide range of cells with conjunctive encodings or mixed selectivity. However, as most experiments examine neural activity within individual tasks, it is currently unclear if and how neural representations change across different task contexts. Within this discussion, the medial temporal lobe is particularly salient, as it is known to be important for multiple behaviors including spatial navigation and memory, however the relationship between these functions is currently unclear. Here, to investigate how representations in single neurons vary across different task contexts in the medial temporal lobe, we collected and analyzed single-neuron activity from human participants as they completed a paired-task session consisting of a passive-viewing visual working memory and a spatial navigation and memory task. Five patients contributed 22 paired-task sessions, which were spike sorted together to allow for the same putative single neurons to be compared between the different tasks. Within each task, we replicated concept-related activations in the working memory task, as well as target-location and serial-position responsive cells in the navigation task. When comparing neuronal activity between tasks, we first established that a significant number of neurons maintained the same kind of representation, responding to stimuli presentations across tasks. Further, we found cells that changed the nature of their representation across tasks, including a significant number of cells that were stimulus responsive in the working memory task that responded to serial position in the spatial task. Overall, our results support a flexible encoding of multiple, distinct aspects of different tasks by single neurons in the human medial temporal lobe, whereby some individual neurons change the nature of their feature coding between task contexts.
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Affiliation(s)
| | - Runnan Cao
- Lane Department of Computer Science and Electrical Engineering, West Virginia University
| | - Claire Z. Han
- Department of Biomedical Engineering, Columbia University
| | | | | | - Shuo Wang
- Department of Radiology, Washington University in St. Louis
| | - Joshua Jacobs
- Department of Biomedical Engineering, Columbia University
- Department of Neurological Surgery, Columbia University
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10
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Laurent MA, Audurier P, De Castro V, Gao X, Durand JB, Jonas J, Rossion B, Cottereau BR. Towards an optimization of functional localizers in non-human primate neuroimaging with (fMRI) frequency-tagging. Neuroimage 2023; 270:119959. [PMID: 36822249 DOI: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2023.119959] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/09/2022] [Revised: 02/16/2023] [Accepted: 02/20/2023] [Indexed: 02/25/2023] Open
Abstract
Non-human primate (NHP) neuroimaging can provide essential insights into the neural basis of human cognitive functions. While functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) localizers can play an essential role in reaching this objective (Russ et al., 2021), they often differ substantially across species in terms of paradigms, measured signals, and data analysis, biasing the comparisons. Here we introduce a functional frequency-tagging face localizer for NHP imaging, successfully developed in humans and outperforming standard face localizers (Gao et al., 2018). FMRI recordings were performed in two awake macaques. Within a rapid 6 Hz stream of natural non-face objects images, human or monkey face stimuli were presented in bursts every 9 s. We also included control conditions with phase-scrambled versions of all images. As in humans, face-selective activity was objectively identified and quantified at the peak of the face-stimulation frequency (0.111 Hz) and its second harmonic (0.222 Hz) in the Fourier domain. Focal activations with a high signal-to-noise ratio were observed in regions previously described as face-selective, mainly in the STS (clusters PL, ML, MF; also, AL, AF), both for human and monkey faces. Robust face-selective activations were also found in the prefrontal cortex of one monkey (PVL and PO clusters). Face-selective neural activity was highly reliable and excluded all contributions from low-level visual cues contained in the amplitude spectrum of the stimuli. These observations indicate that fMRI frequency-tagging provides a highly valuable approach to objectively compare human and monkey visual recognition systems within the same framework.
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Affiliation(s)
| | - Pauline Audurier
- Centre de Recherche Cerveau et Cognition, Université Toulouse 3 Paul Sabatier, CNRS, 31052 Toulouse, France
| | - Vanessa De Castro
- Centre de Recherche Cerveau et Cognition, Université Toulouse 3 Paul Sabatier, CNRS, 31052 Toulouse, France
| | - Xiaoqing Gao
- Center for Psychological Sciences, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou City, China
| | - Jean-Baptiste Durand
- Centre de Recherche Cerveau et Cognition, Université Toulouse 3 Paul Sabatier, CNRS, 31052 Toulouse, France
| | - Jacques Jonas
- Université de Lorraine, CNRS, CRAN, F-54000 Nancy, France; Universite de Lorraine, CHRU-Nancy, Service de neurologie, F-54000, France
| | - Bruno Rossion
- Université de Lorraine, CNRS, CRAN, F-54000 Nancy, France
| | - Benoit R Cottereau
- Centre de Recherche Cerveau et Cognition, Université Toulouse 3 Paul Sabatier, CNRS, 31052 Toulouse, France.
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11
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Donoghue T, Cao R, Han CZ, Holman CM, Brandmeir NJ, Wang S, Jacobs J. Single neurons in the human medial temporal lobe flexibly shift representations across spatial and memory tasks. BIORXIV : THE PREPRINT SERVER FOR BIOLOGY 2023:2023.02.22.529437. [PMID: 36865334 PMCID: PMC9980106 DOI: 10.1101/2023.02.22.529437] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 02/24/2023]
Abstract
Investigations into how individual neurons encode behavioral variables of interest have revealed specific representations in single neurons, such as place and object cells, as well as a wide range of cells with conjunctive encodings or mixed selectivity. However, as most experiments examine neural activity within individual tasks, it is currently unclear if and how neural representations change across different task contexts. Within this discussion, the medial temporal lobe is particularly salient, as it is known to be important for multiple behaviors including spatial navigation and memory, however the relationship between these functions is currently unclear. Here, to investigate how representations in single neurons vary across different task contexts in the MTL, we collected and analyzed single-neuron activity from human participants as they completed a paired-task session consisting of a passive-viewing visual working memory and a spatial navigation and memory task. Five patients contributed 22 paired-task sessions, which were spike sorted together to allow for the same putative single neurons to be compared between the different tasks. Within each task, we replicated concept-related activations in the working memory task, as well as target-location and serial-position responsive cells in the navigation task. When comparing neuronal activity between tasks, we first established that a significant number of neurons maintained the same kind of representation, responding to stimuli presentations across tasks. Further, we found cells that changed the nature of their representation across tasks, including a significant number of cells that were stimulus responsive in the working memory task that responded to serial position in the spatial task. Overall, our results support a flexible encoding of multiple, distinct aspects of different tasks by single neurons in the human MTL, whereby some individual neurons change the nature of their feature coding between task contexts.
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Affiliation(s)
| | - Runnan Cao
- Lane Department of Computer Science and Electrical Engineering, West Virginia University
| | - Claire Z Han
- Department of Biomedical Engineering, Columbia University
| | | | | | - Shuo Wang
- Department of Radiology, Washington University in St. Louis
| | - Joshua Jacobs
- Department of Biomedical Engineering, Columbia University
- Department of Neurological Surgery, Columbia University
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12
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Fu Z, Beam D, Chung JM, Reed CM, Mamelak AN, Adolphs R, Rutishauser U. The geometry of domain-general performance monitoring in the human medial frontal cortex. Science 2022; 376:eabm9922. [PMID: 35511978 DOI: 10.1126/science.abm9922] [Citation(s) in RCA: 35] [Impact Index Per Article: 17.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/02/2022]
Abstract
Controlling behavior to flexibly achieve desired goals depends on the ability to monitor one's own performance. It is unknown how performance monitoring can be both flexible, to support different tasks, and specialized, to perform each task well. We recorded single neurons in the human medial frontal cortex while subjects performed two tasks that involve three types of cognitive conflict. Neurons encoding conflict probability, conflict, and error in one or both tasks were intermixed, forming a representational geometry that simultaneously allowed task specialization and generalization. Neurons encoding conflict retrospectively served to update internal estimates of conflict probability. Population representations of conflict were compositional. These findings reveal how representations of evaluative signals can be both abstract and task-specific and suggest a neuronal mechanism for estimating control demand.
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Affiliation(s)
- Zhongzheng Fu
- Department of Neurosurgery, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA, USA.,Division of Humanities and Social Sciences, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA, USA
| | - Danielle Beam
- Department of Neurosurgery, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA, USA
| | - Jeffrey M Chung
- Department of Neurology, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA, USA
| | - Chrystal M Reed
- Department of Neurology, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA, USA
| | - Adam N Mamelak
- Department of Neurosurgery, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA, USA
| | - Ralph Adolphs
- Division of Humanities and Social Sciences, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA, USA.,Division of Biology and Bioengineering, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA, USA
| | - Ueli Rutishauser
- Department of Neurosurgery, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA, USA.,Department of Neurology, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA, USA.,Division of Biology and Bioengineering, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA, USA.,Center for Neural Science and Medicine, Department of Biomedical Sciences, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA, USA
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13
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Staudigl T, Minxha J, Mamelak AN, Gothard KM, Rutishauser U. Saccade-related neural communication in the human medial temporal lobe is modulated by the social relevance of stimuli. SCIENCE ADVANCES 2022; 8:eabl6037. [PMID: 35302856 PMCID: PMC8932656 DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.abl6037] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/24/2021] [Accepted: 01/26/2022] [Indexed: 05/31/2023]
Abstract
Humans predominantly explore their environment by moving their eyes. To optimally communicate and process visual information, neural activity needs to be coordinated with the execution of eye movements. We investigated the coordination between visual exploration and interareal neural communication by analyzing local field potentials and single neuron activity in patients with epilepsy. We demonstrated that during the free viewing of images, neural communication between the human amygdala and hippocampus is coordinated with the execution of eye movements. The strength and direction of neural communication and hippocampal saccade-related phase alignment were strongest for fixations that landed on human faces. Our results argue that the state of the human medial temporal lobe network is selectively coordinated with motor behavior. Interareal neural communication was facilitated for social stimuli as indexed by the category of the attended information.
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Affiliation(s)
- Tobias Staudigl
- Department of Neurosurgery, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA 90048, USA
- Department of Psychology, Ludwig-Maximilians-University, Munich, Germany
| | - Juri Minxha
- Department of Neurosurgery, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA 90048, USA
- Division of Biology and Biological Engineering, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA 91125, USA
- Center for Theoretical Neuroscience, Columbia University, New York, NY 10027, USA
| | - Adam N. Mamelak
- Department of Neurosurgery, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA 90048, USA
| | - Katalin M. Gothard
- Department of Physiology, College of Medicine, University of Arizona, Tucscon, AZ 85724, USA
| | - Ueli Rutishauser
- Department of Neurosurgery, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA 90048, USA
- Division of Biology and Biological Engineering, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA 91125, USA
- Department of Neurology, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA 90048, USA
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14
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Murray EA, Fellows LK. Prefrontal cortex interactions with the amygdala in primates. Neuropsychopharmacology 2022; 47:163-179. [PMID: 34446829 PMCID: PMC8616954 DOI: 10.1038/s41386-021-01128-w] [Citation(s) in RCA: 28] [Impact Index Per Article: 14.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/29/2021] [Revised: 07/21/2021] [Accepted: 07/22/2021] [Indexed: 02/07/2023]
Abstract
This review addresses functional interactions between the primate prefrontal cortex (PFC) and the amygdala, with emphasis on their contributions to behavior and cognition. The interplay between these two telencephalic structures contributes to adaptive behavior and to the evolutionary success of all primate species. In our species, dysfunction in this circuitry creates vulnerabilities to psychopathologies. Here, we describe amygdala-PFC contributions to behaviors that have direct relevance to Darwinian fitness: learned approach and avoidance, foraging, predator defense, and social signaling, which have in common the need for flexibility and sensitivity to specific and rapidly changing contexts. Examples include the prediction of positive outcomes, such as food availability, food desirability, and various social rewards, or of negative outcomes, such as threats of harm from predators or conspecifics. To promote fitness optimally, these stimulus-outcome associations need to be rapidly updated when an associative contingency changes or when the value of a predicted outcome changes. We review evidence from nonhuman primates implicating the PFC, the amygdala, and their functional interactions in these processes, with links to experimental work and clinical findings in humans where possible.
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Affiliation(s)
| | - Lesley K Fellows
- Department of Neurology and Neurosurgery, Montreal Neurological Institute, McGill University, Montreal, QC, Canada
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15
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Kragel JE, Voss JL. Looking for the neural basis of memory. Trends Cogn Sci 2022; 26:53-65. [PMID: 34836769 PMCID: PMC8678329 DOI: 10.1016/j.tics.2021.10.010] [Citation(s) in RCA: 17] [Impact Index Per Article: 8.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/12/2021] [Revised: 10/14/2021] [Accepted: 10/15/2021] [Indexed: 01/03/2023]
Abstract
Memory neuroscientists often measure neural activity during task trials designed to recruit specific memory processes. Behavior is championed as crucial for deciphering brain-memory linkages but is impoverished in typical experiments that rely on summary judgments. We criticize this approach as being blind to the multiple cognitive, neural, and behavioral processes that occur rapidly within a trial to support memory. Instead, time-resolved behaviors such as eye movements occur at the speed of cognition and neural activity. We highlight successes using eye-movement tracking with in vivo electrophysiology to link rapid hippocampal oscillations to encoding and retrieval processes that interact over hundreds of milliseconds. This approach will improve research on the neural basis of memory because it pinpoints discrete moments of brain-behavior-cognition correspondence.
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Affiliation(s)
- James E Kragel
- Department of Neurology, The University of Chicago, 5841 South Maryland Avenue, Chicago, IL 60637, USA.
| | - Joel L Voss
- Department of Neurology, The University of Chicago, 5841 South Maryland Avenue, Chicago, IL 60637, USA
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16
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Domínguez-Borràs J, Vuilleumier P. Amygdala function in emotion, cognition, and behavior. HANDBOOK OF CLINICAL NEUROLOGY 2022; 187:359-380. [PMID: 35964983 DOI: 10.1016/b978-0-12-823493-8.00015-8] [Citation(s) in RCA: 8] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 06/15/2023]
Abstract
The amygdala is a core structure in the anterior medial temporal lobe, with an important role in several brain functions involving memory, emotion, perception, social cognition, and even awareness. As a key brain structure for saliency detection, it triggers and controls widespread modulatory signals onto multiple areas of the brain, with a great impact on numerous aspects of adaptive behavior. Here we discuss the neural mechanisms underlying these functions, as established by animal and human research, including insights provided in both healthy and pathological conditions.
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Affiliation(s)
- Judith Domínguez-Borràs
- Department of Clinical Psychology and Psychobiology & Institute of Neurosciences, University of Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain
| | - Patrik Vuilleumier
- Department of Neuroscience and Center for Affective Sciences, University of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland.
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17
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Cao R, Li X, Brandmeir NJ, Wang S. Encoding of facial features by single neurons in the human amygdala and hippocampus. Commun Biol 2021; 4:1394. [PMID: 34907323 PMCID: PMC8671411 DOI: 10.1038/s42003-021-02917-1] [Citation(s) in RCA: 18] [Impact Index Per Article: 6.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/11/2021] [Accepted: 11/18/2021] [Indexed: 12/05/2022] Open
Abstract
Faces are salient social stimuli that attract a stereotypical pattern of eye movement. The human amygdala and hippocampus are involved in various aspects of face processing; however, it remains unclear how they encode the content of fixations when viewing faces. To answer this question, we employed single-neuron recordings with simultaneous eye tracking when participants viewed natural face stimuli. We found a class of neurons in the human amygdala and hippocampus that encoded salient facial features such as the eyes and mouth. With a control experiment using non-face stimuli, we further showed that feature selectivity was specific to faces. We also found another population of neurons that differentiated saccades to the eyes vs. the mouth. Population decoding confirmed our results and further revealed the temporal dynamics of face feature coding. Interestingly, we found that the amygdala and hippocampus played different roles in encoding facial features. Lastly, we revealed two functional roles of feature-selective neurons: 1) they encoded the salient region for face recognition, and 2) they were related to perceived social trait judgments. Together, our results link eye movement with neural face processing and provide important mechanistic insights for human face perception.
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Affiliation(s)
- Runnan Cao
- Lane Department of Computer Science and Electrical Engineering, West Virginia University, Morgantown, WV, 26506, USA.
| | - Xin Li
- Lane Department of Computer Science and Electrical Engineering, West Virginia University, Morgantown, WV, 26506, USA
| | - Nicholas J Brandmeir
- Department of Neurosurgery, West Virginia University, Morgantown, WV, 26506, USA
| | - Shuo Wang
- Lane Department of Computer Science and Electrical Engineering, West Virginia University, Morgantown, WV, 26506, USA.
- Department of Radiology, Washington University in St. Louis, St. Louis, MO, 63110, USA.
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18
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Perigenual and Subgenual Anterior Cingulate Afferents Converge on Common Pyramidal Cells in Amygdala Subregions of the Macaque. J Neurosci 2021; 41:9742-9755. [PMID: 34649954 DOI: 10.1523/jneurosci.1056-21.2021] [Citation(s) in RCA: 8] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/20/2021] [Revised: 09/15/2021] [Accepted: 09/29/2021] [Indexed: 11/21/2022] Open
Abstract
The subgenual (sgACC) and perigenual (pgACC) anterior cingulate are important afferents of the amygdala, with different cytoarchitecture, connectivity, and function. The sgACC is associated with arousal mechanisms linked to salient cues, whereas the pgACC is engaged in conflict decision-making, including in social contexts. After placing same-size, small volume tracer injections into sgACC and pgACC of the same hemisphere in male macaques, we examined anterogradely labeled fiber distribution to understand how these different functional systems communicate in the main amygdala nuclei at both mesocopic and cellular levels. The sgACC has broad-based termination patterns. In contrast, the pgACC has a more restricted pattern, which was always nested in sgACC terminals. Terminal overlap occurred in subregions of the accessory basal and basal nuclei, which we termed "hotspots." In triple-labeling confocal studies, the majority of randomly selected CaMKIIα-positive cells (putative amygdala glutamatergic neurons) in hotspots received dual contacts from the sgACC and pgACC. The ratio of dual contacts occurred over a surprisingly narrow range, suggesting a consistent, tight balance of afferent contacts on postsynaptic neurons. Large boutons, which are associated with greater synaptic strength, were ∼3 times more frequent on sgACC versus pgACC axon terminals in hotspots, consistent with a fast "driver" function. Together, the results reveal a nested interaction in which pgACC ("conflict/social monitoring") terminals converge with the broader sgACC ("salience") terminals at both the mesoscopic and cellular level. The presynaptic organization in hotspots suggests that shifts in arousal states can rapidly and flexibly influence decision-making functions in the amygdala.SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT The subgenual (sgACC) and perigenual cingulate (pgACC) have distinct structural and functional characteristics and are important afferent modulators of the amygdala. The sgACC is critical for arousal, whereas the pgACC mediates conflict-monitoring, including in social contexts. Using dual tracer injections in the same monkey, we found that sgACC inputs broadly project in the main amygdala nuclei, whereas pgACC inputs were more restricted and nested in zones containing sgACC terminals (hotspots). The majority of CaMKIIα + (excitatory) amygdala neurons in hotspots received converging contacts, which were tightly balanced. pgACC and sgACC afferent streams are therefore highly interdependent in these specific amygdala subregions, permitting "internal arousal" states to rapidly shape responses of amygdala neurons involved in conflict and social monitoring networks.
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19
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Putnam PT, Chang SWC. Toward a holistic view of value and social processing in the amygdala: Insights from primate behavioral neurophysiology. Behav Brain Res 2021; 411:113356. [PMID: 33989727 PMCID: PMC8238892 DOI: 10.1016/j.bbr.2021.113356] [Citation(s) in RCA: 4] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/01/2021] [Revised: 05/05/2021] [Accepted: 05/09/2021] [Indexed: 11/22/2022]
Abstract
Located medially within the temporal lobes, the amygdala is a formation of heterogenous nuclei that has emerged as a target for investigations into the neural bases of both primitive and complex behaviors. Although modern neuroscience has eschewed the practice of assigning broad functions to distinct brain regions, the amygdala has classically been associated with regulating negative emotional processes (such as fear or aggression), primarily through research performed in rodent models. Contemporary studies, particularly those in non-human primate models, have provided evidence for a role of the amygdala in other aspects of cognition such as valuation of stimuli or shaping social behaviors. Consequently, many modern perspectives now also emphasize the amygdala's role in processing positive affect and social behaviors. Importantly, several recent experiments have examined the intersection of two seemingly autonomous domains; how both valence/value and social stimuli are simultaneously represented in the amygdala. Results from these studies suggest that there is an overlap between valence/value processing and the processing of social behaviors at the level of single neurons. These findings have prompted researchers investigating the neurophysiological mechanisms underlying social interactions to question what contributions reward-related processes in the amygdala make in shaping social behaviors. In this review, we will examine evidence, primarily from primate neurophysiology, suggesting that value-related processes in the amygdala interact with the processing of social stimuli, and explore holistic hypotheses about how these amygdalar interactions might be instantiated.
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Affiliation(s)
- Philip T Putnam
- Department of Psychology, Yale University, New Haven, CT, 06520, United States.
| | - Steve W C Chang
- Department of Psychology, Yale University, New Haven, CT, 06520, United States; Department of Neuroscience, Yale University School of Medicine, New Haven, CT, 06510, United States; Kavli Institute for Neuroscience, Yale University School of Medicine, New Haven, CT, 06511, United States
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20
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Lee SJ, Beam DE, Schjetnan AGP, Paul LK, Chandravadia N, Reed CM, Chung JM, Ross IB, Valiante TA, Mamelak AN, Rutishauser U. Single-neuron correlate of epilepsy-related cognitive deficits in visual recognition memory in right mesial temporal lobe. Epilepsia 2021; 62:2082-2093. [PMID: 34289113 PMCID: PMC8403636 DOI: 10.1111/epi.17010] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/28/2021] [Revised: 07/06/2021] [Accepted: 07/06/2021] [Indexed: 11/28/2022]
Abstract
OBJECTIVE Impaired memory is a common comorbidity of refractory temporal lobe epilepsy (TLE) and often perceived by patients as more problematic than the seizures themselves. The objective of this study is to understand what the relationship of these behavioral impairments is to the underlying pathophysiology, as there are currently no treatments for these deficits, and it remains unknown what circuits are affected. METHODS We recorded single neurons in the medial temporal lobes (MTLs) of 62 patients (37 with refractory TLE) who performed a visual recognition memory task to characterize the relationship between behavior, tuning, and anatomical location of memory selective and visually selective neurons. RESULTS Subjects with a seizure onset zone (SOZ) in the right but not left MTL demonstrated impaired ability to recollect as indicated by the degree of asymmetry of the receiver operating characteristic curve. Of the 1973 recorded neurons, 159 were memory selective (MS) and 366 were visually selective (VS) category cells. The responses of MS neurons located within right but not left MTL SOZs were impaired during high-confidence retrieval trials, mirroring the behavioral deficit seen both in our task and in standardized neuropsychological tests. In contrast, responses of VS neurons were unimpaired in both left and right MTL SOZs. Our findings show that neuronal dysfunction within SOZs in the MTL was specific to a functional cell type and behavior, whereas other cell types respond normally even within the SOZ. We show behavioral metrics that detect right MTL SOZ-related deficits and identify a neuronal correlate of this impairment. SIGNIFICANCE Together, these findings show that single-cell responses can be used to assess the causal effects of local circuit disruption by an SOZ in the MTL, and establish a neural correlate of cognitive impairment due to epilepsy that can be used as a biomarker to assess the efficacy of novel treatments.
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Affiliation(s)
- Seung J Lee
- Department of Neurosurgery, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA, USA.,Department of Neurologic Surgery, Mayo Clinic, Jacksonville, FLA, USA
| | - Danielle E Beam
- Department of Neurosurgery, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA, USA
| | | | - Lynn K Paul
- Division of Humanities and Social Sciences, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA, USA
| | - Nand Chandravadia
- Department of Neurosurgery, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA, USA
| | - Chrystal M Reed
- Department of Neurology, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA, USA
| | - Jeffrey M Chung
- Department of Neurology, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA, USA
| | - Ian B Ross
- Department of Neurosurgery, Huntington Memorial Hospital, Pasadena, CA, USA
| | - Taufik A Valiante
- Krembil Neuroscience Centre, University Health Network, Toronto, ON, Canada.,Division of Neurosurgery, Department of Surgery, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada
| | - Adam N Mamelak
- Department of Neurosurgery, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA, USA
| | - Ueli Rutishauser
- Department of Neurosurgery, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA, USA.,Department of Neurology, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA, USA.,Division of Biology and Biological Engineering, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA, USA.,Center for Neural Science and Medicine, Department of Biomedical Sciences, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA, USA
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21
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Kragel JE, Schuele S, VanHaerents S, Rosenow JM, Voss JL. Rapid coordination of effective learning by the human hippocampus. SCIENCE ADVANCES 2021; 7:7/25/eabf7144. [PMID: 34144985 PMCID: PMC8213228 DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.abf7144] [Citation(s) in RCA: 10] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/14/2020] [Accepted: 05/06/2021] [Indexed: 06/12/2023]
Abstract
Although the human hippocampus is necessary for long-term memory, controversial findings suggest that it may also support short-term memory in the service of guiding effective behaviors during learning. We tested the counterintuitive theory that the hippocampus contributes to long-term memory through remarkably short-term processing, as reflected in eye movements during scene encoding. While viewing scenes for the first time, short-term retrieval operative within the episode over only hundreds of milliseconds was indicated by a specific eye-movement pattern, which was effective in that it enhanced spatiotemporal memory formation. This viewing pattern was predicted by hippocampal theta oscillations recorded from depth electrodes and by shifts toward top-down influence of hippocampal theta on activity within visual perception and attention networks. The hippocampus thus supports short-term memory processing that coordinates behavior in the service of effective spatiotemporal learning.
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Affiliation(s)
- James E Kragel
- Interdepartmental Neuroscience Program, Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, Chicago, IL 60611, USA.
- Department of Medical Social Sciences, Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, Chicago, IL 60611, USA
| | - Stephan Schuele
- Ken and Ruth Davee Department of Neurology, Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, Chicago, IL 60611, USA
| | - Stephen VanHaerents
- Ken and Ruth Davee Department of Neurology, Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, Chicago, IL 60611, USA
| | - Joshua M Rosenow
- Department of Neurological Surgery, Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, Chicago, IL 60611, USA
| | - Joel L Voss
- Interdepartmental Neuroscience Program, Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, Chicago, IL 60611, USA
- Department of Medical Social Sciences, Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, Chicago, IL 60611, USA
- Ken and Ruth Davee Department of Neurology, Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, Chicago, IL 60611, USA
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22
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Orczyk J, Schroeder CE, Abeles IY, Gomez-Ramirez M, Butler PD, Kajikawa Y. Comparison of Scalp ERP to Faces in Macaques and Humans. Front Syst Neurosci 2021; 15:667611. [PMID: 33967709 PMCID: PMC8101630 DOI: 10.3389/fnsys.2021.667611] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/14/2021] [Accepted: 03/30/2021] [Indexed: 02/05/2023] Open
Abstract
Face recognition is an essential activity of social living, common to many primate species. Underlying processes in the brain have been investigated using various techniques and compared between species. Functional imaging studies have shown face-selective cortical regions and their degree of correspondence across species. However, the temporal dynamics of face processing, particularly processing speed, are likely different between them. Across sensory modalities activation of primary sensory cortices in macaque monkeys occurs at about 3/5 the latency of corresponding activation in humans, though this human simian difference may diminish or disappear in higher cortical regions. We recorded scalp event-related potentials (ERPs) to presentation of faces in macaques and estimated the peak latency of ERP components. Comparisons of latencies between macaques (112 ms) and humans (192 ms) suggested that the 3:5 ratio could be preserved in higher cognitive regions of face processing between those species.
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Affiliation(s)
- John Orczyk
- Translational Neuroscience Division, Center for Biological Imaging and Neuromodulation, Nathan Kline Institute for Psychiatric Research, Orangeburg, NY, United States
| | - Charles E Schroeder
- Translational Neuroscience Division, Center for Biological Imaging and Neuromodulation, Nathan Kline Institute for Psychiatric Research, Orangeburg, NY, United States.,Department of Neurological Surgery, Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons, Columbia University Medical Center, New York, NY, United States
| | - Ilana Y Abeles
- Clinical Research Department, Nathan Kline Institute for Psychiatric Research, Orangeburg, NY, United States
| | - Manuel Gomez-Ramirez
- Clinical Research Department, Nathan Kline Institute for Psychiatric Research, Orangeburg, NY, United States
| | - Pamela D Butler
- Clinical Research Department, Nathan Kline Institute for Psychiatric Research, Orangeburg, NY, United States.,Psychiatry Department, School of Medicine, New York University, New York, NY, United States
| | - Yoshinao Kajikawa
- Translational Neuroscience Division, Center for Biological Imaging and Neuromodulation, Nathan Kline Institute for Psychiatric Research, Orangeburg, NY, United States.,Psychiatry Department, School of Medicine, New York University, New York, NY, United States
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23
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Putnam PT, Chang SWC. Social processing by the primate medial frontal cortex. INTERNATIONAL REVIEW OF NEUROBIOLOGY 2021; 158:213-248. [PMID: 33785146 DOI: 10.1016/bs.irn.2020.12.003] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 12/13/2022]
Abstract
The primate medial frontal cortex is comprised of several brain regions that are consistently implicated in regulating complex social behaviors. The medial frontal cortex is also critically involved in many non-social behaviors, such as those involved in reward, affective, and decision-making processes, broadly implicating the fundamental role of the medial frontal cortex in internally guided cognition. An essential question therefore is what unique contributions, if any, does the medial frontal cortex make to social behaviors? In this chapter, we outline several neural algorithms necessary for mediating adaptive social interactions and discuss selected evidence from behavioral neurophysiology experiments supporting the role of the medial frontal cortex in implementing these algorithms. By doing so, we primarily focus on research in nonhuman primates and examine several key attributes of the medial frontal cortex. Specifically, we review neuronal substrates in the medial frontal cortex uniquely suitable for enabling social monitoring, observational and vicarious learning, as well as predicting the behaviors of social partners. Moreover, by utilizing the three levels of organization in information processing systems proposed by Marr (1982) and recently adapted by Lockwood, Apps, and Chang (2020) for social information processing, we survey selected social functions of the medial frontal cortex through the lens of socially relevant algorithms and implementations. Overall, this chapter provides a broad overview of the behavioral neurophysiology literature endorsing the importance of socially relevant neural algorithms implemented by the primate medial frontal cortex for regulating social interactions.
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Affiliation(s)
- Philip T Putnam
- Department of Psychology, Yale University, New Haven, CT, United States.
| | - Steve W C Chang
- Department of Psychology, Yale University, New Haven, CT, United States; Department of Neuroscience, Yale University School of Medicine, New Haven, CT, United States; Kavli Institute for Neuroscience, Yale University School of Medicine, New Haven, CT, United States
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24
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Adams GK, Ong WS, Pearson JM, Watson KK, Platt ML. Neurons in primate prefrontal cortex signal valuable social information during natural viewing. Philos Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci 2021; 376:20190666. [PMID: 33423624 PMCID: PMC7815429 DOI: 10.1098/rstb.2019.0666] [Citation(s) in RCA: 4] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/12/2022] Open
Abstract
Information about social partners is innately valuable to primates. Decisions about which sources of information to consume are highly naturalistic but also complex and place unusually strong demands on the brain's decision network. In particular, both the orbitofrontal cortex (OFC) and lateral prefrontal cortex (LPFC) play key roles in decision making and social behaviour, suggesting a likely role in social information-seeking as well. To test this idea, we developed a 'channel surfing' task in which monkeys were shown a series of 5 s video clips of conspecifics engaged in natural behaviours at a field site. Videos were annotated frame-by-frame using an ethogram of species-typical behaviours, an important source of social information. Between each clip, monkeys were presented with a choice between targets that determined which clip would be seen next. Monkeys' gaze during playback indicated differential engagement depending on what behaviours were presented. Neurons in both OFC and LPFC responded to choice targets and to video, and discriminated a subset of the behaviours in the ethogram during video viewing. These findings suggest that both OFC and LPFC are engaged in processing social information that is used to guide dynamic information-seeking decisions. This article is part of the theme issue 'Existence and prevalence of economic behaviours among non-human primates'.
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Affiliation(s)
- Geoffrey K Adams
- Department of Neuroscience, Perelman School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA, USA
| | - Wei Song Ong
- Department of Neuroscience, Perelman School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA, USA
| | - John M Pearson
- Department of Biostatistics and Bioinformatics, Duke University, Durham, NC, USA
| | - Karli K Watson
- Institute of Cognitive Science, University of Colorado at Boulder, Boulder, CO, USA
| | - Michael L Platt
- Department of Neuroscience, Perelman School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA, USA.,Department of Psychology, School of Arts and Sciences, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA, USA.,Marketing Department, Wharton School of Business, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA, USA
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25
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The Architecture of Human Memory: Insights from Human Single-Neuron Recordings. J Neurosci 2020; 41:883-890. [PMID: 33257323 DOI: 10.1523/jneurosci.1648-20.2020] [Citation(s) in RCA: 31] [Impact Index Per Article: 7.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/30/2020] [Revised: 09/24/2020] [Accepted: 09/27/2020] [Indexed: 02/08/2023] Open
Abstract
Deciphering the mechanisms of human memory is a central goal of neuroscience, both from the point of view of the fundamental biology of memory and for its translational relevance. Here, we review some contributions that recordings from neurons in humans implanted with electrodes for clinical purposes have made toward this goal. Recordings from the medial temporal lobe, including the hippocampus, reveal the existence of two classes of cells: those encoding highly selective and invariant representations of abstract concepts, and memory-selective cells whose activity is related to familiarity and episodic retrieval. Insights derived from observing these cells in behaving humans include that semantic representations are activated before episodic representations, that memory content and memory strength are segregated, and that the activity of both types of cells is related to subjective awareness as expected from a substrate for declarative memory. Visually selective cells can remain persistently active for several seconds, thereby revealing a cellular substrate for working memory in humans. An overarching insight is that the neural code of human memory is interpretable at the single-neuron level. Jointly, intracranial recording studies are starting to reveal aspects of the building blocks of human memory at the single-cell level. This work establishes a bridge to cellular-level work in animals on the one hand, and the extensive literature on noninvasive imaging in humans on the other hand. More broadly, this work is a step toward a detailed mechanistic understanding of human memory that is needed to develop therapies for human memory disorders.
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26
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Hesse JK, Tsao DY. The macaque face patch system: a turtle’s underbelly for the brain. Nat Rev Neurosci 2020; 21:695-716. [DOI: 10.1038/s41583-020-00393-w] [Citation(s) in RCA: 38] [Impact Index Per Article: 9.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Accepted: 09/30/2020] [Indexed: 02/06/2023]
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27
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Comparative Brain Imaging Reveals Analogous and Divergent Patterns of Species and Face Sensitivity in Humans and Dogs. J Neurosci 2020; 40:8396-8408. [PMID: 33020215 PMCID: PMC7577605 DOI: 10.1523/jneurosci.2800-19.2020] [Citation(s) in RCA: 15] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/18/2019] [Revised: 05/26/2020] [Accepted: 06/20/2020] [Indexed: 02/08/2023] Open
Abstract
Conspecific-preference in social perception is evident for multiple sensory modalities and in many species. There is also a dedicated neural network for face processing in primates. However, the evolutionary origin and the relative role of neural species sensitivity and face sensitivity in visuo-social processing are largely unknown. Conspecific-preference in social perception is evident for multiple sensory modalities and in many species. There is also a dedicated neural network for face processing in primates. However, the evolutionary origin and the relative role of neural species sensitivity and face sensitivity in visuo-social processing are largely unknown. In this comparative study, species sensitivity and face sensitivity to identical visual stimuli (videos of human and dog faces and occiputs) were examined using functional magnetic resonance imaging in dogs (n = 20; 45% female) and humans (n = 30; 50% female). In dogs, the bilateral mid suprasylvian gyrus showed conspecific-preference, no regions exhibited face-preference, and the majority of the visually-responsive cortex showed greater conspecific-preference than face-preference. In humans, conspecific-preferring regions (the right amygdala/hippocampus and the posterior superior temporal sulcus) also showed face-preference, and much of the visually-responsive cortex showed greater face-preference than conspecific-preference. Multivariate pattern analyses (MVPAs) identified species-sensitive regions in both species, but face-sensitive regions only in humans. Across-species representational similarity analyses (RSAs) revealed stronger correspondence between dog and human response patterns for distinguishing conspecific from heterospecific faces than other contrasts. Results unveil functional analogies in dog and human visuo-social processing of conspecificity but suggest that cortical specialization for face perception may not be ubiquitous across mammals. SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT To explore the evolutionary origins of human face-preference and its relationship to conspecific-preference, we conducted the first comparative and noninvasive visual neuroimaging study of a non-primate and a primate species, dogs and humans. Conspecific-preferring brain regions were observed in both species, but face-preferring brain regions were observed only in humans. In dogs, an overwhelming majority of visually-responsive cortex exhibited greater conspecific-preference than face-preference, whereas in humans, much of the visually-responsive cortex showed greater face-preference than conspecific-preference. Together, these findings unveil functional analogies and differences in the organizing principles of visuo-social processing across two phylogenetically distant mammal species.
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Morrow JK, Cohen MX, Gothard KM. Mesoscopic-scale functional networks in the primate amygdala. eLife 2020; 9:57341. [PMID: 32876047 PMCID: PMC7490012 DOI: 10.7554/elife.57341] [Citation(s) in RCA: 5] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/27/2020] [Accepted: 08/24/2020] [Indexed: 11/13/2022] Open
Abstract
The primate amygdala performs multiple functions that may be related to the anatomical heterogeneity of its nuclei. Individual neurons with stimulus- and task-specific responses are not clustered in any of the nuclei, suggesting that single-units may be too-fine grained to shed light on the mesoscale organization of the amygdala. We have extracted from local field potentials recorded simultaneously from multiple locations within the primate (Macaca mulatta) amygdala spatially defined and statistically separable responses to visual, tactile, and auditory stimuli. A generalized eigendecomposition-based method of source separation isolated coactivity patterns, or components, that in neurophysiological terms correspond to putative subnetworks. Some component spatial patterns mapped onto the anatomical organization of the amygdala, while other components reflected integration across nuclei. These components differentiated between visual, tactile, and auditory stimuli suggesting the presence of functionally distinct parallel subnetworks.
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Affiliation(s)
- Jeremiah K Morrow
- Department of Physiology, University of Arizona, Tucson, United States.,Department of Behavioral Neuroscience, Oregon Health and Sciences University, Portland, United States
| | - Michael X Cohen
- Radboud University Medical Center, Nijmegen, Netherlands.,Donders Center for Neuroscience, Nijmegen, Netherlands
| | - Katalin M Gothard
- Department of Physiology, University of Arizona, Tucson, United States
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Abstract
Brain-wide circuits that coordinate affective and social behaviours intersect in the amygdala. Consequently, amygdala lesions cause a heterogeneous array of social and non-social deficits. Social behaviours are not localized to subdivisions of the amygdala even though the inputs and outputs that carry social signals are anatomically restricted to distinct subnuclear regions. This observation may be explained by the multidimensional response properties of the component neurons. Indeed, the multitudes of circuits that converge in the amygdala enlist the same subset of neurons into different ensembles that combine social and non-social elements into high-dimensional representations. These representations may enable flexible, context-dependent social decisions. As such, multidimensional processing may operate in parallel with subcircuits of genetically identical neurons that serve specialized and functionally dissociable functions. When combined, the activity of specialized circuits may grant specificity to social behaviours, whereas multidimensional processing facilitates the flexibility and nuance needed for complex social behaviour.
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30
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Skiba RM, Vuilleumier P. Brain Networks Processing Temporal Information in Dynamic Facial Expressions. Cereb Cortex 2020; 30:6021-6038. [DOI: 10.1093/cercor/bhaa176] [Citation(s) in RCA: 4] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/24/2019] [Revised: 04/30/2020] [Accepted: 05/22/2020] [Indexed: 11/14/2022] Open
Abstract
Abstract
This fMRI study examines the role of local and global motion information in facial movements during exposure to novel dynamic face stimuli. We found that synchronous expressions distinctively engaged medial prefrontal areas in the rostral and caudal sectors of anterior cingulate cortex (r/cACC) extending to inferior supplementary motor areas, as well as motor cortex and bilateral superior frontal gyrus (global temporal-spatial processing). Asynchronous expressions in which one part of the face unfolded before the other activated more the right superior temporal sulcus (STS) and inferior frontal gyrus (local temporal-spatial processing). These differences in temporal dynamics had no effect on visual face-responsive areas. Dynamic causal modeling analysis further showed that processing of asynchronous expression features was associated with a differential information flow, centered on STS, which received direct input from occipital cortex and projected to the amygdala. Moreover, STS and amygdala displayed selective interactions with cACC where the integration of both local and global motion cues could take place. These results provide new evidence for a role of local and global temporal dynamics in emotional expressions, extracted in partly separate brain pathways. Importantly, we show that dynamic expressions with synchronous movement cues may distinctively engage brain areas responsible for motor execution of expressions.
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Affiliation(s)
- Rafal M Skiba
- Laboratory for Behavioural Neurology and Imaging of Cognition, Department of Basic Neuroscience, University of Geneva, 1211 Geneva, Switzerland
- Swiss Center for Affective Science, University of Geneva, Campus Biotech, 1202 Geneva, Switzerland
| | - Patrik Vuilleumier
- Laboratory for Behavioural Neurology and Imaging of Cognition, Department of Basic Neuroscience, University of Geneva, 1211 Geneva, Switzerland
- Swiss Center for Affective Science, University of Geneva, Campus Biotech, 1202 Geneva, Switzerland
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31
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Aquino TG, Minxha J, Dunne S, Ross IB, Mamelak AN, Rutishauser U, O'Doherty JP. Value-Related Neuronal Responses in the Human Amygdala during Observational Learning. J Neurosci 2020; 40:4761-4772. [PMID: 32376780 PMCID: PMC7294800 DOI: 10.1523/jneurosci.2897-19.2020] [Citation(s) in RCA: 19] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/05/2019] [Revised: 03/25/2020] [Accepted: 04/25/2020] [Indexed: 02/02/2023] Open
Abstract
The amygdala plays an important role in many aspects of social cognition and reward learning. Here, we aimed to determine whether human amygdala neurons are involved in the computations necessary to implement learning through observation. We performed single-neuron recordings from the amygdalae of human neurosurgical patients (male and female) while they learned about the value of stimuli through observing the outcomes experienced by another agent interacting with those stimuli. We used a detailed computational modeling approach to describe patients' behavior in the task. We found a significant proportion of amygdala neurons whose activity correlated with both expected rewards for oneself and others, and in tracking outcome values received by oneself or other agents. Additionally, a population decoding analysis suggests the presence of information for both observed and experiential outcomes in the amygdala. Encoding and decoding analyses suggested observational value coding in amygdala neurons occurred in a different subset of neurons than experiential value coding. Collectively, these findings support a key role for the human amygdala in the computations underlying the capacity for learning through observation.SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT Single-neuron studies of the human brain provide a unique window into the computational mechanisms of cognition. In this study, epilepsy patients implanted intracranially with hybrid depth electrodes performed an observational learning (OL) task. We measured single-neuron activity in the amygdala and found a representation for observational rewards as well as observational expected reward values. Additionally, distinct subsets of amygdala neurons represented self-experienced and observational values. This study provides a rare glimpse into the role of human amygdala neurons in social cognition.
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Affiliation(s)
- Tomas G Aquino
- Computation and Neural Systems, Division of Biology and Biological Engineering, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA 91125
| | - Juri Minxha
- Computation and Neural Systems, Division of Biology and Biological Engineering, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA 91125
| | - Simon Dunne
- Computation and Neural Systems, Division of Biology and Biological Engineering, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA 91125
| | - Ian B Ross
- Department of Neurosurgery, Huntington Memorial Hospital, Pasadena, CA 91105
| | - Adam N Mamelak
- Department of Neurosurgery, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Pasadena, CA 90048
| | - Ueli Rutishauser
- Computation and Neural Systems, Division of Biology and Biological Engineering, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA 91125
- Department of Neurosurgery, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Pasadena, CA 90048
| | - John P O'Doherty
- Computation and Neural Systems, Division of Biology and Biological Engineering, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA 91125
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32
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Kamiński J, Brzezicka A, Mamelak AN, Rutishauser U. Combined Phase-Rate Coding by Persistently Active Neurons as a Mechanism for Maintaining Multiple Items in Working Memory in Humans. Neuron 2020; 106:256-264.e3. [PMID: 32084331 PMCID: PMC7217299 DOI: 10.1016/j.neuron.2020.01.032] [Citation(s) in RCA: 27] [Impact Index Per Article: 6.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/03/2019] [Revised: 12/25/2019] [Accepted: 01/23/2020] [Indexed: 01/01/2023]
Abstract
Maintaining multiple items in working memory (WM) is central to human behavior. Persistently active neurons are thought to be a mechanism to maintain WMs, but it remains unclear how such activity is coordinated when multiple items are kept in memory. We show that memoranda-selective persistently active neurons in the human medial temporal lobe phase lock to ongoing slow-frequency (1-7 Hz) oscillations during WM maintenance. The properties of phase locking are dependent on memory content and load. During high memory loads, the phase of the oscillatory activity to which neurons phase lock provides information about memory content not available in the firing rate of the neurons. We provide a computational model that reveals that inhibitory-feedback-mediated competition between multiple persistently active neurons reproduces this phenomenon. This work reveals a mechanism for the active maintenance of multiple items in WM that relies on persistently active neurons whose activation is orchestrated by oscillatory activity.
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Affiliation(s)
- Jan Kamiński
- Department of Neurosurgery, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, 8700 Beverly Boulevard, Los Angeles, CA 90048, USA; Division of Biology and Biological Engineering, California Institute of Technology, 1200 E California Boulevard, Pasadena, CA 91125, USA.
| | - Aneta Brzezicka
- Department of Neurosurgery, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, 8700 Beverly Boulevard, Los Angeles, CA 90048, USA; Institute of Psychology, SWPS University of Social Sciences and Humanities, Warsaw 03-815, Poland
| | - Adam N Mamelak
- Department of Neurosurgery, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, 8700 Beverly Boulevard, Los Angeles, CA 90048, USA
| | - Ueli Rutishauser
- Department of Neurosurgery, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, 8700 Beverly Boulevard, Los Angeles, CA 90048, USA; Department of Neurology, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, 8700 Beverly Boulevard, Los Angeles, CA 90048, USA; Center for Neural Science and Medicine, Department of Biomedical Sciences, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, 8700 Beverly Boulevard, Los Angeles, CA 90048, USA; Division of Biology and Biological Engineering, California Institute of Technology, 1200 E California Boulevard, Pasadena, CA 91125, USA.
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Leopold DA, Park SH. Studying the visual brain in its natural rhythm. Neuroimage 2020; 216:116790. [PMID: 32278093 DOI: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2020.116790] [Citation(s) in RCA: 15] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/08/2019] [Revised: 03/26/2020] [Accepted: 03/30/2020] [Indexed: 12/27/2022] Open
Abstract
How the brain fluidly orchestrates visual behavior is a central question in cognitive neuroscience. Researchers studying neural responses in humans and nonhuman primates have mapped out visual response profiles and cognitive modulation in a large number of brain areas, most often using pared down stimuli and highly controlled behavioral paradigms. The historical emphasis on reductionism has placed most studies at one pole of an inherent trade-off between strictly controlled experimental variables and open designs that monitor the brain during its natural modes of operation. This bias toward simplified experiments has strongly shaped the field of visual neuroscience, with little guarantee that the principles and concepts established within that framework will apply more generally. In recent years, a growing number of studies have begun to relax strict experimental control with the aim of understanding how the brain responds under more naturalistic conditions. In this article, we survey research that has explicitly embraced the complexity and rhythm of natural vision. We focus on those studies most pertinent to understanding high-level visual specializations in brains of humans and nonhuman primates. We conclude that representationalist concepts borne from conventional visual experiments fall short in their ability to capture the real-life visual operations undertaken by the brain. More naturalistic approaches, though fraught with experimental and analytic challenges, provide fertile ground for neuroscientists seeking new inroads to investigate how the brain supports core aspects of our daily visual experience.
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Affiliation(s)
- David A Leopold
- Section on Cognitive Neurophysiology and Imaging, Laboratory of Neuropsychology, National Institute of Mental Health, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD, 20892, USA; Neurophysiology Imaging Facility, National Institute of Mental Health, National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke, National Eye Institute, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD, 20892, USA.
| | - Soo Hyun Park
- Section on Cognitive Neurophysiology and Imaging, Laboratory of Neuropsychology, National Institute of Mental Health, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD, 20892, USA
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34
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Wang S, Mamelak AN, Adolphs R, Rutishauser U. Abstract goal representation in visual search by neurons in the human pre-supplementary motor area. Brain 2019; 142:3530-3549. [PMID: 31549164 PMCID: PMC6821249 DOI: 10.1093/brain/awz279] [Citation(s) in RCA: 11] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/06/2019] [Revised: 06/14/2019] [Accepted: 07/11/2019] [Indexed: 01/18/2023] Open
Abstract
The medial frontal cortex is important for goal-directed behaviours such as visual search. The pre-supplementary motor area (pre-SMA) plays a critical role in linking higher-level goals to actions, but little is known about the responses of individual cells in this area in humans. Pre-SMA dysfunction is thought to be a critical factor in the cognitive deficits that are observed in diseases such as Parkinson's disease and schizophrenia, making it important to develop a better mechanistic understanding of the pre-SMA's role in cognition. We simultaneously recorded single neurons in the human pre-SMA and eye movements while subjects performed goal-directed visual search tasks. We characterized two groups of neurons in the pre-SMA. First, 40% of neurons changed their firing rate whenever a fixation landed on the search target. These neurons responded to targets in an abstract manner across several conditions and tasks. Responses were invariant to motor output (i.e. button press or not), and to different ways of defining the search target (by instruction or pop-out). Second, ∼50% of neurons changed their response as a function of fixation order. Together, our results show that human pre-SMA neurons carry abstract signals during visual search that indicate whether a goal was reached in an action- and cue-independent manner. This suggests that the pre-SMA contributes to goal-directed behaviour by flexibly signalling goal detection and time elapsed since start of the search, and this process occurs regardless of task. These observations provide insights into how pre-SMA dysfunction might impact cognitive function.
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Affiliation(s)
- Shuo Wang
- Department of Chemical and Biomedical Engineering, and Rockefeller Neuroscience Institute, West Virginia University, Morgantown, WV, USA
- Division of Biology and Biological Engineering, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA, USA
| | - Adam N Mamelak
- Department of Neurosurgery, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA, USA
| | - Ralph Adolphs
- Division of Biology and Biological Engineering, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA, USA
| | - Ueli Rutishauser
- Division of Biology and Biological Engineering, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA, USA
- Department of Neurosurgery, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA, USA
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35
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Multidimensional Neural Selectivity in the Primate Amygdala. eNeuro 2019; 6:ENEURO.0153-19.2019. [PMID: 31533960 PMCID: PMC6791828 DOI: 10.1523/eneuro.0153-19.2019] [Citation(s) in RCA: 16] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/25/2019] [Revised: 09/05/2019] [Accepted: 09/06/2019] [Indexed: 11/24/2022] Open
Abstract
The amygdala contributes to multiple functions including attention allocation, sensory processing, decision-making, and the elaboration of emotional behaviors. The diversity of functions attributed to the amygdala is reflected in the response selectivity of its component neurons. Previous work claimed that subsets of neurons differentiate between broad categories of stimuli (e.g., objects vs faces, rewards vs punishment), while other subsets are narrowly specialized to respond to individual faces or facial features (e.g., eyes). Here we explored the extent to which the same neurons contribute to more than one neural subpopulation in a task that activated multiple functions of the amygdala. The subjects (Macaca mulatta) watched videos depicting conspecifics or inanimate objects, and learned by trial and error to choose the individuals or objects associated with the highest rewards. We found that the same neurons responded selectively to two or more of the following task events or stimulus features: (1) alerting, task-related stimuli (fixation icon, video start, and video end); (2) reward magnitude; (3) stimulus categories (social vs nonsocial); and (4) stimulus-unique features (faces, eyes). A disproportionate number of neurons showed selectivity for all of the examined stimulus features and task events. These results suggest that neurons that appear specialized and uniquely tuned to specific stimuli (e.g., face cells, eye cells) are likely to respond to multiple other types of stimuli or behavioral events, if/when these become behaviorally relevant in the context of a complex task. This multidimensional selectivity supports a flexible, context-dependent evaluation of inputs and subsequent decision making based on the activity of the same neural ensemble.
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36
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Murphy AP, Leopold DA. A parameterized digital 3D model of the Rhesus macaque face for investigating the visual processing of social cues. J Neurosci Methods 2019; 324:108309. [PMID: 31229584 PMCID: PMC7446874 DOI: 10.1016/j.jneumeth.2019.06.001] [Citation(s) in RCA: 17] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/10/2019] [Revised: 05/31/2019] [Accepted: 06/01/2019] [Indexed: 12/22/2022]
Abstract
BACKGROUND Rhesus macaques are the most popular model species for studying the neural basis of visual face processing and social interaction using intracranial methods. However, the challenge of creating realistic, dynamic, and parametric macaque face stimuli has limited the experimental control and ethological validity of existing approaches. NEW METHOD We performed statistical analyses of in vivo computed tomography data to generate an anatomically accurate, three-dimensional representation of Rhesus macaque cranio-facial morphology. The surface structures were further edited, rigged and textured by a professional digital artist with careful reference to photographs of macaque facial expression, colouration and pelage. RESULTS The model offers precise, continuous, parametric control of craniofacial shape, emotional expression, head orientation, eye gaze direction, and many other parameters that can be adjusted to render either static or dynamic high-resolution faces. Example single-unit responses to such stimuli in macaque inferotemporal cortex demonstrate the value of parametric control over facial appearance and behaviours. COMPARISON WITH EXISTING METHOD(S) The generation of such a high-dimensionality and systematically controlled stimulus set of conspecific faces, with accurate craniofacial modelling and professional finalization of facial details, is currently not achievable using existing methods. CONCLUSIONS The results herald a new set of possibilities in adaptive sampling of a high-dimensional and socially meaningful feature space, thus opening the door to systematic testing of hypotheses about the abundant neural specialization for faces found in the primate.
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Affiliation(s)
- Aidan P Murphy
- Section on Cognitive Neurophysiology and Imaging, NIMH, Bethesda, MD, USA.
| | - David A Leopold
- Section on Cognitive Neurophysiology and Imaging, NIMH, Bethesda, MD, USA
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37
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Selective response of the nucleus taeniae of the amygdala to a naturalistic social stimulus in visually naive domestic chicks. Sci Rep 2019; 9:9849. [PMID: 31285532 PMCID: PMC6614359 DOI: 10.1038/s41598-019-46322-5] [Citation(s) in RCA: 26] [Impact Index Per Article: 5.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/26/2019] [Accepted: 06/18/2019] [Indexed: 01/17/2023] Open
Abstract
The detection of animate beings at the onset of life is important for phylogenetically distant species, such as birds and primates. Naïve chicks preferentially approach a stimulus resembling a conspecific (a stuffed fowl) over a less naturalistic one (a scrambled version of the stuffed fowl, presenting the same low-level visual features as the fowl in an unnatural configuration). The neuronal mechanisms underlying this behavior are mostly unknown. However, it has been hypothesized that innate social predispositions may involve subpallial brain areas including the amygdala. Here we asked whether a stuffed hen would activate areas of the arcopallium/amygdala complex, in particular the nucleus taeniae of the amygdala (TnA) or septum. We measured brain activity by visualizing the immediate early gene product c-Fos. After exposure to the hen, TnA showed higher density of c-Fos expressing neurons, compared to chicks that were exposed to the scrambled stimulus. A similar trend was present in the lower portion of the arcopallium, but not in the upper portion of the arcopallium or in the septum. This demonstrates that at birth the TnA is already engaged in responses to social visual stimuli, suggesting an important role for this nucleus in the early ontogenetic development of social behavior.
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38
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Wang S, Chandravadia N, Mamelak AN, Rutishauser U. Simultaneous Eye Tracking and Single-Neuron Recordings in Human Epilepsy Patients. J Vis Exp 2019. [PMID: 31259902 DOI: 10.3791/59117] [Citation(s) in RCA: 5] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 10/31/2022] Open
Abstract
Intracranial recordings from patients with intractable epilepsy provide a unique opportunity to study the activity of individual human neurons during active behavior. An important tool for quantifying behavior is eye tracking, which is an indispensable tool for studying visual attention. However, eye tracking is challenging to use concurrently with invasive electrophysiology and this approach has consequently been little used. Here, we present a proven experimental protocol to conduct single-neuron recordings with simultaneous eye tracking in humans. We describe how the systems are connected and the optimal settings to record neurons and eye movements. To illustrate the utility of this method, we summarize results that were made possible by this setup. This data shows how using eye tracking in a memory-guided visual search task allowed us to describe a new class of neurons called target neurons, whose response was reflective of top-down attention to the current search target. Lastly, we discuss the significance and solutions to potential problems of this setup. Together, our protocol and results suggest that single-neuron recordings with simultaneous eye tracking in humans are an effective method to study human brain function. It provides a key missing link between animal neurophysiology and human cognitive neuroscience.
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Affiliation(s)
- Shuo Wang
- Department of Chemical and Biomedical Engineering, and Rockefeller Neuroscience Institute, West Virginia University;
| | - Nand Chandravadia
- Departments of Neurosurgery and Neurology, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center
| | - Adam N Mamelak
- Departments of Neurosurgery and Neurology, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center;
| | - Ueli Rutishauser
- Departments of Neurosurgery and Neurology, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center; Center for Neural Science and Medicine, Department of Biomedical Sciences, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center; Division of Biology and Biological Engineering, California Institute of Technology;
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39
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Brzezicka A, Kamiński J, Reed CM, Chung JM, Mamelak AN, Rutishauser U. Working Memory Load-related Theta Power Decreases in Dorsolateral Prefrontal Cortex Predict Individual Differences in Performance. J Cogn Neurosci 2019; 31:1290-1307. [PMID: 31037988 DOI: 10.1162/jocn_a_01417] [Citation(s) in RCA: 46] [Impact Index Per Article: 9.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/04/2022]
Abstract
Holding information in working memory (WM) is an active and effortful process that is accompanied by sustained load-dependent changes in oscillatory brain activity. These proportional power increases are often reported in EEG studies recording theta over frontal midline sites. Intracranial recordings, however, yield mixed results, depending on the brain area being recorded from. We recorded intracranial EEG with depth electrodes in 13 patients with epilepsy who were performing a Sternberg WM task. Here, we investigated patterns of theta power changes as a function of memory load during maintenance in three areas critical for WM: dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC), dorsal ACC (dACC), and hippocampus. Theta frequency power in both hippocampus and dACC increased during maintenance. In contrast, theta frequency power in the DLPFC decreased during maintenance, and this decrease was proportional to memory load. Only the power decreases in DLPFC, but not the power increases in hippocampus and dACC, were predictive of behavior in a given trial. The extent of the load-related theta power decreases in the DLPFC in a given participant predicted a participant's RTs, revealing that DLPFC theta explains individual differences in WM ability between participants. Together, these data reveal a pattern of theta power decreases in the DLPFC that is predictive of behavior and that is opposite of that in other brain areas. This result suggests that theta band power changes serve different cognitive functions in different brain areas and specifically that theta power decreases in DLPFC have an important role in maintenance of information.
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Affiliation(s)
- Aneta Brzezicka
- Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA.,SWPS University of Social Sciences and Humanities, Warsaw, Poland
| | - Jan Kamiński
- Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA.,California Institute of Technology
| | | | | | | | - Ueli Rutishauser
- Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA.,California Institute of Technology
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40
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Rutishauser U. Testing Models of Human Declarative Memory at the Single-Neuron Level. Trends Cogn Sci 2019; 23:510-524. [PMID: 31031021 DOI: 10.1016/j.tics.2019.03.006] [Citation(s) in RCA: 18] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.6] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/14/2019] [Revised: 03/15/2019] [Accepted: 03/20/2019] [Indexed: 11/19/2022]
Abstract
Deciphering the mechanisms of declarative memory is a major goal of neuroscience. While much theoretical progress has been made, it has proven difficult to experimentally verify key predictions of some foundational models of memory. Recently, single-neuron recordings in human patients have started to provide direct experimental verification of some theories, including mnemonic evidence accumulation, balance-of-evidence for confidence judgments, sparse coding, contextual reinstatement, and the ventral tegmental area (VTA)-hippocampus loop model. Here, we summarize the cell types that have been described in the medial temporal lobe and posterior parietal cortex, discuss their properties, and reflect on how these findings inform theoretical work. This body of work exemplifies the scientific power of a synergistic combination of modeling and human single-neuron recordings to advance cognitive neuroscience.
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Affiliation(s)
- Ueli Rutishauser
- Department of Neurosurgery, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA, USA; Department of Neurology, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA, USA; Center for Neural Science and Medicine, Department of Biomedical Sciences, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA, USA; Division of Biology and Biological Engineering, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA, USA.
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41
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Hur J, Stockbridge MD, Fox AS, Shackman AJ. Dispositional negativity, cognition, and anxiety disorders: An integrative translational neuroscience framework. PROGRESS IN BRAIN RESEARCH 2019; 247:375-436. [PMID: 31196442 PMCID: PMC6578598 DOI: 10.1016/bs.pbr.2019.03.012] [Citation(s) in RCA: 57] [Impact Index Per Article: 11.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 12/13/2022]
Abstract
When extreme, anxiety can become debilitating. Anxiety disorders, which often first emerge early in development, are common and challenging to treat, yet the underlying mechanisms have only recently begun to come into focus. Here, we review new insights into the nature and biological bases of dispositional negativity, a fundamental dimension of childhood temperament and adult personality and a prominent risk factor for the development of pediatric and adult anxiety disorders. Converging lines of epidemiological, neurobiological, and mechanistic evidence suggest that dispositional negativity increases the likelihood of psychopathology via specific neurocognitive mechanisms, including attentional biases to threat and deficits in executive control. Collectively, these observations provide an integrative translational framework for understanding the development and maintenance of anxiety disorders in adults and youth and set the stage for developing improved intervention strategies.
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Affiliation(s)
- Juyoen Hur
- Department of Psychology, University of Maryland, College Park, MD, United States.
| | | | - Andrew S Fox
- Department of Psychology, University of California, Davis, CA, United States; California National Primate Research Center, University of California, Davis, CA, United States
| | - Alexander J Shackman
- Department of Psychology, University of Maryland, College Park, MD, United States; Neuroscience and Cognitive Science Program, University of Maryland, College Park, MD, United States; Maryland Neuroimaging Center, University of Maryland, College Park, MD, United States.
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42
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Multisensory Neurons in the Primate Amygdala. J Neurosci 2019; 39:3663-3675. [PMID: 30858163 DOI: 10.1523/jneurosci.2903-18.2019] [Citation(s) in RCA: 23] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.6] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/11/2018] [Revised: 02/12/2019] [Accepted: 02/13/2019] [Indexed: 11/21/2022] Open
Abstract
Animals identify, interpret, and respond to complex, natural signals that are often multisensory. The ability to integrate signals across sensory modalities depends on the convergence of sensory inputs at the level of single neurons. Neurons in the amygdala are expected to be multisensory because they respond to complex, natural stimuli, and the amygdala receives inputs from multiple sensory areas. We recorded activity from the amygdala of 2 male monkeys (Macaca mulatta) in response to visual, tactile, and auditory stimuli. Although the stimuli were devoid of inherent emotional or social significance and were not paired with rewards or punishments, the majority of neurons that responded to these stimuli were multisensory. Selectivity for sensory modality was stronger and emerged earlier than selectivity for individual items within a sensory modality. Modality and item selectivity were expressed via three main spike-train metrics: (1) response magnitude, (2) response polarity, and (3) response duration. None of these metrics were unique to a particular sensory modality; rather, each neuron responded with distinct combinations of spike-train metrics to discriminate sensory modalities and items within a modality. The relative proportion of multisensory neurons was similar across the nuclei of the amygdala. The convergence of inputs of multiple sensory modalities at the level of single neurons in the amygdala rests at the foundation for multisensory integration. The integration of visual, auditory, and tactile inputs in the amygdala may serve social communication by binding together social signals carried by facial expressions, vocalizations, and social grooming.SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT Our brain continuously decodes information detected by multiple sensory systems. The emotional and social significance of the incoming signals is likely extracted by the amygdala, which receives input from all sensory domains. Here we show that a large portion of neurons in the amygdala respond to stimuli from two or more sensory modalities. The convergence of visual, tactile, and auditory signals at the level of individual neurons in the amygdala establishes a foundation for multisensory integration within this structure. The ability to integrate signals across sensory modalities is critical for social communication and other high-level cognitive functions.
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Barrett LF. Seeing Fear: It's All in the Eyes? Trends Neurosci 2019; 41:559-563. [PMID: 30143181 DOI: 10.1016/j.tins.2018.06.009] [Citation(s) in RCA: 4] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/18/2018] [Accepted: 06/25/2018] [Indexed: 01/08/2023]
Abstract
Is an amygdala necessary to experience and perceive fear? Intriguing evidence comes from patient S.M. who lost her left and right amygdalae to disease. Initial testing suggested that S.M.'s most defining symptom was an inability to recognize fear in other people's facial expressions. A fascinating paper by Adolphs and colleagues in 2005 examined one potential mechanism for this impairment: a failure to spontaneously attend to widened eyes, the most distinctive physical feature portrayed in symbolic fear expressions. This study helped to invigorate debates about the brain basis of fear and paved the way for a more nuanced understanding of amygdalar function.
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Affiliation(s)
- Lisa Feldman Barrett
- Department of Psychology, 125 Nightingale Hall, Northeastern University, Boston, MA 02115, USA; Psychiatric Neuroimaging Division, Department of Psychiatry, Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA; Athinoula A. Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging, Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, MA, USA.
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Fu Z, Wu DAJ, Ross I, Chung JM, Mamelak AN, Adolphs R, Rutishauser U. Single-Neuron Correlates of Error Monitoring and Post-Error Adjustments in Human Medial Frontal Cortex. Neuron 2019; 101:165-177.e5. [PMID: 30528064 PMCID: PMC6354767 DOI: 10.1016/j.neuron.2018.11.016] [Citation(s) in RCA: 69] [Impact Index Per Article: 13.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/14/2018] [Revised: 10/12/2018] [Accepted: 11/08/2018] [Indexed: 11/30/2022]
Abstract
Humans can self-monitor errors without explicit feedback, resulting in behavioral adjustments on subsequent trials such as post-error slowing (PES). The error-related negativity (ERN) is a well-established macroscopic scalp EEG correlate of error self-monitoring, but its neural origins and relationship to PES remain unknown. We recorded in the frontal cortex of patients performing a Stroop task and found neurons that track self-monitored errors and error history in dorsal anterior cingulate cortex (dACC) and pre-supplementary motor area (pre-SMA). Both the intracranial ERN (iERN) and error neuron responses appeared first in pre-SMA, and ∼50 ms later in dACC. Error neuron responses were correlated with iERN amplitude on individual trials. In dACC, such error neuron-iERN synchrony and responses of error-history neurons predicted the magnitude of PES. These data reveal a human single-neuron correlate of the ERN and suggest that dACC synthesizes error information to recruit behavioral control through coordinated neural activity.
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Affiliation(s)
- Zhongzheng Fu
- Division of Engineering and Applied Sciences, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA, USA; Control and Dynamical Systems Program, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA, USA; Department of Neurosurgery, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA, USA.
| | - Daw-An J Wu
- Division of Humanities and Social Sciences, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA, USA
| | - Ian Ross
- Department of Neurosurgery, Huntington Memorial Hospital, Pasadena, CA, USA
| | - Jeffrey M Chung
- Department of Neurology, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA, USA
| | - Adam N Mamelak
- Department of Neurosurgery, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA, USA
| | - Ralph Adolphs
- Division of Biology and Biological Engineering, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA, USA; Division of Humanities and Social Sciences, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA, USA; Computation and Neural Systems Program, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA, USA
| | - Ueli Rutishauser
- Division of Biology and Biological Engineering, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA, USA; Computation and Neural Systems Program, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA, USA; Department of Neurology, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA, USA; Department of Neurosurgery, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA, USA; Center for Neural Science and Medicine, Department of Biomedical Sciences, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA, USA.
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Weston CSE. Amygdala Represents Diverse Forms of Intangible Knowledge, That Illuminate Social Processing and Major Clinical Disorders. Front Hum Neurosci 2018; 12:336. [PMID: 30186129 PMCID: PMC6113401 DOI: 10.3389/fnhum.2018.00336] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/07/2018] [Accepted: 08/02/2018] [Indexed: 01/21/2023] Open
Abstract
Amygdala is an intensively researched brain structure involved in social processing and multiple major clinical disorders, but its functions are not well understood. The functions of a brain structure are best hypothesized on the basis of neuroanatomical connectivity findings, and of behavioral, neuroimaging, neuropsychological and physiological findings. Among the heaviest neuroanatomical interconnections of amygdala are those with perirhinal cortex (PRC), but these are little considered in the theoretical literature. PRC integrates complex, multimodal, meaningful and fine-grained distributed representations of objects and conspecifics. Consistent with this connectivity, amygdala is hypothesized to contribute meaningful and fine-grained representations of intangible knowledge for integration by PRC. Behavioral, neuroimaging, neuropsychological and physiological findings further support amygdala mediation of a diversity of such representations. These representations include subjective valence, impact, economic value, noxiousness, importance, ingroup membership, social status, popularity, trustworthiness and moral features. Further, the formation of amygdala representations is little understood, and is proposed to be often implemented through embodied cognition mechanisms. The hypothesis builds on earlier work, and makes multiple novel contributions to the literature. It highlights intangible knowledge, which is an influential but insufficiently researched factor in social and other behaviors. It contributes to understanding the heavy but neglected amygdala-PRC interconnections, and the diversity of amygdala-mediated intangible knowledge representations. Amygdala is a social brain region, but it does not represent species-typical social behaviors. A novel proposal to clarify its role is postulated. The hypothesis is also suggested to illuminate amygdala's involvement in several core symptoms of autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Specifically, novel and testable explanations are proposed for the ASD symptoms of disorganized visual scanpaths, apparent social disinterest, preference for concrete cognition, aspects of the disorder's heterogeneity, and impairment in some activities of daily living. Together, the presented hypothesis demonstrates substantial explanatory potential in the neuroscience, social and clinical domains.
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Amygdala lesions eliminate viewing preferences for faces in rhesus monkeys. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A 2018; 115:8043-8048. [PMID: 30012600 DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1807245115] [Citation(s) in RCA: 52] [Impact Index Per Article: 8.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 12/30/2022] Open
Abstract
In free-viewing experiments, primates orient preferentially toward faces and face-like stimuli. To investigate the neural basis of this behavior, we measured the spontaneous viewing preferences of monkeys with selective bilateral amygdala lesions. The results revealed that when faces and nonface objects were presented simultaneously, monkeys with amygdala lesions had no viewing preference for either conspecific faces or illusory facial features in everyday objects. Instead of directing eye movements toward socially relevant features in natural images, we found that, after amygdala loss, monkeys are biased toward features with increased low-level salience. We conclude that the amygdala has a role in our earliest specialized response to faces, a behavior thought to be a precursor for efficient social communication and essential for the development of face-selective cortex.
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Wang S, Mamelak AN, Adolphs R, Rutishauser U. Encoding of Target Detection during Visual Search by Single Neurons in the Human Brain. Curr Biol 2018; 28:2058-2069.e4. [PMID: 29910078 DOI: 10.1016/j.cub.2018.04.092] [Citation(s) in RCA: 23] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/05/2018] [Revised: 04/03/2018] [Accepted: 04/27/2018] [Indexed: 10/14/2022]
Abstract
Neurons in the primate medial temporal lobe (MTL) respond selectively to visual categories such as faces, contributing to how the brain represents stimulus meaning. However, it remains unknown whether MTL neurons continue to encode stimulus meaning when it changes flexibly as a function of variable task demands imposed by goal-directed behavior. While classically associated with long-term memory, recent lesion and neuroimaging studies show that the MTL also contributes critically to the online guidance of goal-directed behaviors such as visual search. Do such tasks modulate responses of neurons in the MTL, and if so, do their responses mirror bottom-up input from visual cortices or do they reflect more abstract goal-directed properties? To answer these questions, we performed concurrent recordings of eye movements and single neurons in the MTL and medial frontal cortex (MFC) in human neurosurgical patients performing a memory-guided visual search task. We identified a distinct population of target-selective neurons in both the MTL and MFC whose response signaled whether the currently fixated stimulus was a target or distractor. This target-selective response was invariant to visual category and predicted whether a target was detected or missed behaviorally during a given fixation. The response latencies, relative to fixation onset, of MFC target-selective neurons preceded those in the MTL by ∼200 ms, suggesting a frontal origin for the target signal. The human MTL thus represents not only fixed stimulus identity, but also task-specified stimulus relevance due to top-down goal relevance.
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Affiliation(s)
- Shuo Wang
- Department of Chemical and Biomedical Engineering, and Rockefeller Neuroscience Institute, West Virginia University, 1 Medical Center Dr, Morgantown, WV 26506, USA; Computation and Neural Systems, California Institute of Technology, 1200 E California Blvd, Pasadena, CA 91125, USA.
| | - Adam N Mamelak
- Departments of Neurosurgery and Neurology, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, 8700 Beverly Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90048, USA
| | - Ralph Adolphs
- Computation and Neural Systems, California Institute of Technology, 1200 E California Blvd, Pasadena, CA 91125, USA; Division of Biology and Biological Engineering, California Institute of Technology, 1200 E California Blvd, Pasadena, CA 91125, USA.
| | - Ueli Rutishauser
- Departments of Neurosurgery and Neurology, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, 8700 Beverly Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90048, USA; Center for Neural Science and Medicine, Department of Biomedical Sciences, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, 8700 Beverly Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90048, USA; Division of Biology and Biological Engineering, California Institute of Technology, 1200 E California Blvd, Pasadena, CA 91125, USA.
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Faraut MCM, Carlson AA, Sullivan S, Tudusciuc O, Ross I, Reed CM, Chung JM, Mamelak AN, Rutishauser U. Dataset of human medial temporal lobe single neuron activity during declarative memory encoding and recognition. Sci Data 2018; 5:180010. [PMID: 29437158 PMCID: PMC5810422 DOI: 10.1038/sdata.2018.10] [Citation(s) in RCA: 24] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/12/2017] [Accepted: 12/08/2017] [Indexed: 11/09/2022] Open
Abstract
We present a dataset of 1,576 single neurons recorded from the human amygdala and hippocampus in 65 sessions from 42 patients undergoing intracranial monitoring for localization of epileptic seizures. Subjects performed a recognition memory task with pictures as stimuli. Subjects were asked to identify whether they had seen a particular image the first time ('new') or second time ('old') on a 1-6 confidence scale. This comprehensive dataset includes the spike times of all neurons and their extracellular waveforms, behavior, electrode locations determined from post-operative MRI scans, demographics, and the stimuli shown. As technical validation, we provide spike sorting quality metrics and assessment of tuning of cells to verify the presence of visually-and memory selective cells. We also provide analysis code that reproduces key scientific findings published previously on a smaller version of this dataset. Together, this large dataset will facilitate the investigation of the neural mechanism of declarative memory by providing a substantial number of hard to obtain human single-neuron recordings during a well characterized behavioral task.
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Affiliation(s)
- Mailys C. M. Faraut
- Department of Neurosurgery, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA 90048, USA
| | - April A. Carlson
- Department of Neurosurgery, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA 90048, USA
| | - Shannon Sullivan
- Department of Neurosurgery, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA 90048, USA
| | - Oana Tudusciuc
- Division of Biology and Biological Engineering, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA 91125, USA
| | - Ian Ross
- Department of Neurosurgery, Huntington Memorial Hospital, Pasadena, CA 91125, USA
| | - Chrystal M. Reed
- Department of Neurology, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA 90048, USA
| | - Jeffrey M. Chung
- Department of Neurology, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA 90048, USA
| | - Adam N Mamelak
- Department of Neurosurgery, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA 90048, USA
| | - Ueli Rutishauser
- Department of Neurosurgery, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA 90048, USA
- Division of Biology and Biological Engineering, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA 91125, USA
- Department of Neurology, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA 90048, USA
- Computation and Neural Systems Program, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA 91125, USA
- Center for Neural Science and Medicine, Department of Biomedical Science, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA 90048, USA
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ISODA M, NORITAKE A, NINOMIYA T. Development of social systems neuroscience using macaques. PROCEEDINGS OF THE JAPAN ACADEMY. SERIES B, PHYSICAL AND BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES 2018; 94:305-323. [PMID: 30078829 PMCID: PMC6117490 DOI: 10.2183/pjab.94.020] [Citation(s) in RCA: 10] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/29/2018] [Accepted: 05/25/2018] [Indexed: 06/08/2023]
Abstract
This paper reviews the literature on social neuroscience studies using macaques in the hope of encouraging as many researchers as possible to participate in this field of research and thereby accelerate the system-level understanding of social cognition and behavior. We describe how different parts of the primate brain are engaged in different aspects of social information processing, with particular emphasis on the use of experimental paradigms involving more than one monkey in laboratory settings. The description begins with how individual neurons are used for evaluating socially relevant information, such as the identity, face, and focus of attention of others in various social contexts. A description of the neural bases of social reward processing and social action monitoring follows. Finally, we provide several perspectives on novel experimental strategies to help clarify the nature of interacting brains under more socially and ecologically plausible conditions.
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Affiliation(s)
- Masaki ISODA
- Division of Behavioral Development, Department of System Neuroscience, National Institute for Physiological Sciences, National Institutes of Natural Sciences, Okazaki, Japan
- Department of Physiological Sciences, School of Life Science, The Graduate University for Advanced Studies (SOKENDAI), Hayama, Japan
| | - Atsushi NORITAKE
- Division of Behavioral Development, Department of System Neuroscience, National Institute for Physiological Sciences, National Institutes of Natural Sciences, Okazaki, Japan
- Department of Physiological Sciences, School of Life Science, The Graduate University for Advanced Studies (SOKENDAI), Hayama, Japan
| | - Taihei NINOMIYA
- Division of Behavioral Development, Department of System Neuroscience, National Institute for Physiological Sciences, National Institutes of Natural Sciences, Okazaki, Japan
- Department of Physiological Sciences, School of Life Science, The Graduate University for Advanced Studies (SOKENDAI), Hayama, Japan
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Minxha J, Mamelak AN, Rutishauser U. Surgical and Electrophysiological Techniques for Single-Neuron Recordings in Human Epilepsy Patients. NEUROMETHODS 2018. [DOI: 10.1007/978-1-4939-7549-5_14] [Citation(s) in RCA: 10] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 12/12/2022]
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