When music and long-term memory interact: effects of musical expertise on functional and structural plasticity in the hippocampus

Building a realistic, scalable memory model with independent engrams using a homeostatic mechanism

Memory formation is usually associated with Hebbian learning and synaptic plasticity, which changes the synaptic strengths but omits structural changes. A recent study suggests that structural plasticity can also lead to silent memory engrams, reproducing a conditioned learning paradigm with neuron ensembles. However, this study is limited by its way of synapse formation, enabling the formation of only one memory engram. Overcoming this, our model allows the formation of many engrams simultaneously while retaining high neurophysiological accuracy, e.g., as found in cortical columns. We achieve this by substituting the random synapse formation with the Model of Structural Plasticity. As a homeostatic model, neurons regulate their activity by growing and pruning synaptic elements based on their current activity. Utilizing synapse formation based on the Euclidean distance between the neurons with a scalable algorithm allows us to easily simulate 4 million neurons with 343 memory engrams. These engrams do not interfere with one another by default, yet we can change the simulation parameters to form long-reaching associations. Our model's analysis shows that homeostatic engram formation requires a certain spatiotemporal order of events. It predicts that synaptic pruning precedes and enables synaptic engram formation and that it does not occur as a mere compensatory response to enduring synapse potentiation as in Hebbian plasticity with synaptic scaling. Our model paves the way for simulations addressing further inquiries, ranging from memory chains and hierarchies to complex memory systems comprising areas with different learning mechanisms.

The transformative power of music: Insights into neuroplasticity, health, and disease

Music is a universal language that can elicit profound emotional and cognitive responses. In this literature review, we explore the intricate relationship between music and the brain, from how it is decoded by the nervous system to its therapeutic potential in various disorders. Music engages a diverse network of brain regions and circuits, including sensory-motor processing, cognitive, memory, and emotional components. Music-induced brain network oscillations occur in specific frequency bands, and listening to one's preferred music can grant easier access to these brain functions. Moreover, music training can bring about structural and functional changes in the brain, and studies have shown its positive effects on social bonding, cognitive abilities, and language processing. We also discuss how music therapy can be used to retrain impaired brain circuits in different disorders. Understanding how music affects the brain can open up new avenues for music-based interventions in healthcare, education, and wellbeing.

Age-related decrease in inter-subject similarity of cortical morphology and task and resting-state functional connectivity

"All old people are the same" is an unfortunate characterization of the perceived homogeneity in the older age group. This study attempts to debunk this myth in the context of the structural and functional brain. Within older relative to younger age groups, individuals are hypothesized to be more dissimilar to their similar-aged peers-thus demonstrating an age-related divergence. This study analyzed functional connectivity (FC) during multiple fMRI paradigms (2 rest + 5 tasks) and cortical thickness (CT) data from two lifespan datasets (Ntotal = 1161). On average, between-subject FC/CT correlations became weaker in the older age groups. Further analyses ruled out the possibility that more rapid age-related changes in older brains have increased the dissimilarity in these older age groups. Brain-wide analyses revealed significant effects of age-related divergence across most of the brain. Finally, CT similarity between a dyad significantly predicted their FC similarity across multiple fMRI task paradigms-demonstrating a close relationship between brain structure and function even at the between-dyad level. Contrary to the myth that "all old people are the same," these findings suggest young people are more similar to each other. This study presents major implications in the study of neural fingerprinting and brain-behavior associations.

Beyond the Sound Waves: A Comprehensive Exploration of the Burn-In Phenomenon in Audio Equipment Across Physiological, Psychological, and Societal Domains

Audio burn-in, often referred to as the process by which audio equipment undergoes a series of played sounds to achieve optimal performance, remains a topic of significant debate within both audiophile communities and relevant scientific fields. While some attribute perceived changes in sound quality to actual physical changes in the equipment, an emerging perspective points to the interplay of physiological, psychological, and social factors that might influence these perceptions. This narrative review delves into the intricate layers of auditory physiology, cognitive sound interpretation, and the wider societal beliefs around burn-in. We underscore the importance of discerning between actual physical changes in audio gear and the multifaceted human factors that potentially modulate our perception of sound. Through a comprehensive exploration, this article illuminates the complexities of this phenomenon, offering insights for both medical professionals and passionate audio enthusiasts and proposing directions for future research.

Musical experience prior to traumatic exposure as a resilience factor: a conceptual analysis

Resilience mechanisms can be dynamically triggered throughout the lifecourse by resilience factors in order to prevent individuals from developing stress-related pathologies such as posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Some interventional studies have suggested that listening to music and musical practice after experiencing a traumatic event decrease the intensity of PTSD, but surprisingly, no study to our knowledge has explored musical experience as a potential resilience factor before the potential occurrence of a traumatic event. In the present conceptual analysis, we sought to summarize what is known about the concept of resilience and how musical experience could trigger two key mechanisms altered in PTSD: emotion regulation and cognitive control. Our hypothesis is that the stimulation of these two mechanisms by musical experience during the pre-traumatic period could help protect against the symptoms of emotional dysregulation and intrusions present in PTSD. We then developed a new framework to guide future research aimed at isolating and investigating the protective role of musical experience regarding the development of PTSD in response to trauma. The clinical application of this type of research could be to develop pre-trauma training that promotes emotional regulation and cognitive control, aimed at populations at risk of developing PTSD such as healthcare workers, police officers, and military staffs.

Dissociations between musical semantic memory and verbal memory in a patient with behavioral variant frontotemporal dementia

OBJECTIVES

Patients with dementia show dissociations between musical semantic memory (i.e., spared musical lexicon) and other memory modalities, except in some severe cases. We aim to study, from a neuropsychological point of view, the dissociation between musical semantic memory compared to language and verbal memory in a patient with severe Behavioral Variant Frontotemporal Dementia (bvFTD). We hypothesize a single dissociation between these domains will be found, with sparing of musical semantic memory.

METHODS

LC, a patient with severe bvFTD, and three matched controls were assessed through language, semantic, and episodic memory, and musical semantic memory tasks. The control group had similar music taste as LC: to participate as controls, tango must be one of their favorite musical genres.

RESULTS

LC showed impairment in all Verbal Memory tasks, but not in musical tasks. There was a dissociation between musical semantic memory, and language and verbal semantic memory.

CONCLUSIONS

The musical lexicon can be preserved in advanced stages of dementia, which supports the idea that music can be a therapeutic tool in patients with severe dementia.

The hearing hippocampus

The hippocampus has a well-established role in spatial and episodic memory but a broader function has been proposed including aspects of perception and relational processing. Neural bases of sound analysis have been described in the pathway to auditory cortex, but wider networks supporting auditory cognition are still being established. We review what is known about the role of the hippocampus in processing auditory information, and how the hippocampus itself is shaped by sound. In examining imaging, recording, and lesion studies in species from rodents to humans, we uncover a hierarchy of hippocampal responses to sound including during passive exposure, active listening, and the learning of associations between sounds and other stimuli. We describe how the hippocampus' connectivity and computational architecture allow it to track and manipulate auditory information - whether in the form of speech, music, or environmental, emotional, or phantom sounds. Functional and structural correlates of auditory experience are also identified. The extent of auditory-hippocampal interactions is consistent with the view that the hippocampus makes broad contributions to perception and cognition, beyond spatial and episodic memory. More deeply understanding these interactions may unlock applications including entraining hippocampal rhythms to support cognition, and intervening in links between hearing loss and dementia.

Musical expertise shapes visual-melodic memory integration

Music can act as a mnemonic device that can elicit multiple memories. How musical and non-musical information integrate into complex cross-modal memory representations has however rarely been investigated. Here, we studied the ability of human subjects to associate visual objects with melodies. Musical laypersons and professional musicians performed an associative inference task that tested the ability to form and memorize paired associations between objects and melodies (“direct trials”) and to integrate these pairs into more complex representations where melodies are linked with two objects across trials (“indirect trials”). We further investigated whether and how musical expertise modulates these two processes. We analyzed accuracy and reaction times (RTs) of direct and indirect trials in both groups. We reasoned that the musical and cross-modal memory demands of musicianship might modulate performance in the task and might thus reveal mechanisms that underlie the association and integration of visual information with musical information. Although musicians showed a higher overall memory accuracy, non-musicians’ accuracy was well above chance level in both trial types, thus indicating a significant ability to associate and integrate musical with visual information even in musically untrained subjects. However, non-musicians showed shorter RTs in indirect compared to direct trials, whereas the reverse pattern was found in musicians. Moreover, accuracy of direct and indirect trials correlated significantly in musicians but not in non-musicians. Consistent with previous accounts of visual associative memory, we interpret these findings as suggestive of at least two complimentary mechanisms that contribute to visual-melodic memory integration. (I) A default mechanism that mainly operates at encoding of complex visual-melodic associations and that works with surprising efficacy even in musically untrained subjects. (II) A retrieval-based mechanism that critically depends on an expert ability to maintain and discriminate visual-melodic associations across extended memory delays. Future studies may investigate how these mechanisms contribute to the everyday experience of music-evoked memories.

Associations between abstract working memory abilities and brain activity underlying long-term recognition of auditory sequences

Memory is a complex cognitive process composed of several subsystems, namely short- and long-term memory and working memory (WM). Previous research has shown that adequate interaction between subsystems is crucial for successful memory processes such as encoding, storage, and manipulation of information. However, few studies have investigated the relationship between different subsystems at the behavioral and neural levels. Thus, here we assessed the relationship between individual WM abilities and brain activity underlying the recognition of previously memorized auditory sequences. First, recognition of previously memorized versus novel auditory sequences was associated with a widespread network of brain areas comprising the cingulate gyrus, hippocampus, insula, inferior temporal cortex, frontal operculum, and orbitofrontal cortex. Second, we observed positive correlations between brain activity underlying auditory sequence recognition and WM. We showed a sustained positive correlation in the medial cingulate gyrus, a brain area that was widely involved in the auditory sequence recognition. Remarkably, we also observed positive correlations in the inferior temporal, temporal-fusiform, and postcentral gyri, brain areas that were not strongly associated with auditory sequence recognition. In conclusion, we discovered positive correlations between WM abilities and brain activity underlying long-term recognition of auditory sequences, providing new evidence on the relationship between memory subsystems. Furthermore, we showed that high WM performers recruited a larger brain network including areas associated with visual processing (i.e., inferior temporal, temporal-fusiform, and postcentral gyri) for successful auditory memory recognition.

Musical Activity During Life Is Associated With Multi-Domain Cognitive and Brain Benefits in Older Adults

Regular musical activity as a complex multimodal lifestyle activity is proposed to be protective against age-related cognitive decline and Alzheimer’s disease. This cross-sectional study investigated the association and interplay between musical instrument playing during life, multi-domain cognitive abilities and brain morphology in older adults (OA) from the DZNE-Longitudinal Cognitive Impairment and Dementia Study (DELCODE) study. Participants reporting having played a musical instrument across three life periods (n = 70) were compared to controls without a history of musical instrument playing (n = 70), well-matched for reserve proxies of education, intelligence, socioeconomic status and physical activity. Participants with musical activity outperformed controls in global cognition, working memory, executive functions, language, and visuospatial abilities, with no effects seen for learning and memory. The musically active group had greater gray matter volume in the somatosensory area, but did not differ from controls in higher-order frontal, temporal, or hippocampal volumes. However, the association between gray matter volume in distributed frontal-to-temporal regions and cognitive abilities was enhanced in participants with musical activity compared to controls. We show that playing a musical instrument during life relates to better late-life cognitive abilities and greater brain capacities in OA. Musical activity may serve as a multimodal enrichment strategy that could help preserve cognitive and brain health in late life. Longitudinal and interventional studies are needed to support this notion.

Music affects functional brain connectivity and is effective in the treatment of neurological disorders

In a million years, under the pressure of natural selection, hominins have acquired the abilities for vocal learning, music, and language. Music is a relevant human activity, highly effective in enhancing sociality, is a universal experience common to all known human cultures, although it varies in rhythmic and melodic complexity. It has been part of human life since the beginning of our history, or almost, and it strengthens the mother-baby relation even within the mother's womb. Music engages multiple cognitive functions, and promotes attention, concentration, imagination, creativity, elicits memories and emotions, and stimulates imagination, and harmony of movement. It changes the chemistry of the brain, by inducing the release of neurotransmitters and hormones (dopamine, serotonin, and oxytocin) and activates the reward and prosocial systems. In addition, music is also used to develop new therapies necessary to alleviate severe illness, especially neurological disorders, and brain injuries.

Does Amount of Information Support Aesthetic Values?

Obtaining information from the world is important for survival. The brain, therefore, has special mechanisms to extract as much information as possible from sensory stimuli. Hence, given its importance, the amount of available information may underlie aesthetic values. Such information-based aesthetic values would be significant because they would compete with others to drive decision-making. In this article, we ask, "What is the evidence that amount of information support aesthetic values?" An important concept in the measurement of informational volume is entropy. Research on aesthetic values has thus used Shannon entropy to evaluate the contribution of quantity of information. We review here the concepts of information and aesthetic values, and research on the visual and auditory systems to probe whether the brain uses entropy or other relevant measures, specially, Fisher information, in aesthetic decisions. We conclude that information measures contribute to these decisions in two ways: first, the absolute quantity of information can modulate aesthetic preferences for certain sensory patterns. However, the preference for volume of information is highly individualized, with information-measures competing with organizing principles, such as rhythm and symmetry. In addition, people tend to be resistant to too much entropy, but not necessarily, high amounts of Fisher information. We show that this resistance may stem in part from the distribution of amount of information in natural sensory stimuli. Second, the measurement of entropic-like quantities over time reveal that they can modulate aesthetic decisions by varying degrees of surprise given temporally integrated expectations. We propose that amount of information underpins complex aesthetic values, possibly informing the brain on the allocation of resources or the situational appropriateness of some cognitive models.

Neural Advantages of Older Musicians Involve the Cerebellum: Implications for Healthy Aging Through Lifelong Musical Instrument Training

This study compared 30 older musicians and 30 age-matched non-musicians to investigate the association between lifelong musical instrument training and age-related cognitive decline and brain atrophy (musicians: mean age 70.8 years, musical experience 52.7 years; non-musicians: mean age 71.4 years, no or less than 3 years of musical experience). Although previous research has demonstrated that young musicians have larger gray matter volume (GMV) in the auditory-motor cortices and cerebellum than non-musicians, little is known about older musicians. Music imagery in young musicians is also known to share a neural underpinning [the supramarginal gyrus (SMG) and cerebellum] with music performance. Thus, we hypothesized that older musicians would show superiority to non-musicians in some of the abovementioned brain regions. Behavioral performance, GMV, and brain activity, including functional connectivity (FC) during melodic working memory (MWM) tasks, were evaluated in both groups. Behaviorally, musicians exhibited a much higher tapping speed than non-musicians, and tapping speed was correlated with executive function in musicians. Structural analyses revealed larger GMVs in both sides of the cerebellum of musicians, and importantly, this was maintained until very old age. Task-related FC analyses revealed that musicians possessed greater cerebellar-hippocampal FC, which was correlated with tapping speed. Furthermore, musicians showed higher activation in the SMG during MWM tasks; this was correlated with earlier commencement of instrumental training. These results indicate advantages or heightened coupling in brain regions associated with music performance and imagery in musicians. We suggest that lifelong instrumental training highly predicts the structural maintenance of the cerebellum and related cognitive maintenance in old age.

An ALE meta-analytic review of top-down and bottom-up processing of music in the brain

A remarkable feature of the human brain is its ability to integrate information from the environment with internally generated content. The integration of top-down and bottom-up processes during complex multi-modal human activities, however, is yet to be fully understood. Music provides an excellent model for understanding this since music listening leads to the urge to move, and music making entails both playing and listening at the same time (i.e., audio-motor coupling). Here, we conducted activation likelihood estimation (ALE) meta-analyses of 130 neuroimaging studies of music perception, production and imagery, with 2660 foci, 139 experiments, and 2516 participants. We found that music perception and production rely on auditory cortices and sensorimotor cortices, while music imagery recruits distinct parietal regions. This indicates that the brain requires different structures to process similar information which is made available either by an interaction with the environment (i.e., bottom-up) or by internally generated content (i.e., top-down).

Neural plasticity: The substratum of music-based interventions in neurorehabilitation

BACKGROUND

The plastic nature of the human brain lends itself to experience and training-based structural changes leading to functional recovery. Music, with its multimodal activation of the brain, serves as a useful model for neurorehabilitation through neuroplastic changes in dysfunctional or impaired networks. Neurologic Music Therapy (NMT) contributes to the field of neurorehabilitation using this rationale.

OBJECTIVE

The purpose of this article is to present a discourse on the concept of neuroplasticity and music-based neuroplasticity through the techniques of NMT in the domain of neurological rehabilitation.

METHODS

The article draws on observations and findings made by researchers in the areas of neuroplasticity, music-based neuroplastic changes, NMT in neurological disorders and the implication of further research in this field.

RESULTS

A commentary on previous research reveal that interventions based on the NMT paradigm have been successfully used to train neural networks using music-based tasks and paradigms which have been explained to have cross-modal effects on sensorimotor, language and cognitive and affective functions.

CONCLUSIONS

Multimodal gains using music-based interventions highlight the brain plasticity inducing function of music. Individual differences do play a predictive role in neurological gains associated with such interventions. This area deserves further exploration and application-based studies.

Evidence for a visual bias when recalling complex narratives

Although it is understood that episodic memories of everyday events involve encoding a wide array of perceptual and non-perceptual information, it is unclear how these distinct types of information are recalled. To address this knowledge gap, we examine how perceptual (visual versus auditory) and non-perceptual details described within a narrative, a proxy for everyday event memories, were retrieved. Based on previous work indicating a bias for visual content, we hypothesized that participants would be most accurate at recalling visually described details and would tend to falsely recall non-visual details with visual descriptors. In Study 1, participants watched videos of a protagonist telling narratives of everyday events under three conditions: with visual, auditory, or audiovisual details. All narratives contained the same non-perceptual content. Participants' free recall of these narratives under each condition were scored for the type of details recalled (perceptual, non-perceptual) and whether the detail was recalled with gist or verbatim memory. We found that participants were more accurate at gist and verbatim recall for visual perceptual details. This visual bias was also evident when we examined the errors made during recall such that participants tended to incorrectly recall details with visual information, but not with auditory information. Study 2 tested for this pattern of results when the narratives were presented in auditory only format. Results conceptually replicated Study 1 in that there was still a persistent visual bias in what was recollected from the complex narratives. Together, these findings indicate a bias for recruiting visualizable content to construct complex multi-detail memories.

Does playing a musical instrument reduce the incidence of cognitive impairment and dementia? A systematic review and meta-analysis

Objectives: High levels of life course intellectually-stimulating activity are hypothesised to produce a cognitive reserve that mitigates against overt cognitive impairment in the face of neuropathology. Leisure-time musical instrument playing could be a viable source of that stimulation, but to date no systematic review has been undertaken to investigate the effect of musical instrument playing on the incidence of cognitive impairment and dementia.Methods: A systematic review and meta-analysis including any study with musical instrument playing as the exposure, and cognitive impairment and/or dementia as the outcome.Results: 1211 unduplicated articles were identified from literature searching, of which three articles were included: two cohort studies and one twin study. All studies were of good methodological quality, and reported large protective effects of musical instrument playing. The twin study reported that musicians were 64% less likely to develop mild cognitive impairment or dementia, after additionally adjusting for sex, education and physical activity. A meta-analysis of the cohort studies found a 59% reduction in the risk of developing dementia within the study follow up. The evidence base is limited by size, small sample sizes and the risk of reverse causality.Conclusion: The three identified studies that investigated the specific relationship of musical instrument playing and subsequent incidence of cognitive impairment and dementia all reported a large protective association. The results are encouraging but should be interpreted with caution. Larger, more focussed studies are required to further explore this association, with a particular need to consider the cumulative lifetime quantity of music playing.

Left lateral parietal rTMS improves cognition and modulates resting brain connectivity in patients with Alzheimer's disease: Possible role of BDNF and oxidative stress

Repetitive Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation (rTMS) is a non-invasive neuromodulation technique which is increasingly used for cognitive impairment in Alzheimer's Disease (AD). Although rTMS has been shown to modify Brain-Derived Neurotrophic Factor (BDNF) and oxidative stress levels in many neurological and psychiatric diseases, there is still no study evaluating the relationship between memory performance, BDNF, oxidative stress, and resting brain connectivity following rTMS in Alzheimer's patients. Furthermore, there are increasing clinical data showing that the stimulation of strategic brain regions may lead to more robust improvements in memory functions compared to conventional rTMS. In this study, we aimed to evaluate the possible disease-modifying effects of rTMS on the lateral parietal cortex in AD patients who have the highest connectivity with the hippocampus. To fill the mentioned research gaps, we have evaluated the relationships between resting-state Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI), cognitive scores, blood BDNF levels, and total oxidative/antioxidant status to explain the therapeutic and potential disease-modifying effects of rTMS which has been applied at 20 Hz frequencies for two weeks. Our results showed significantly increased visual recognition memory functions and clock drawing test scores which were associated with elevated peripheral BDNF levels, and decreased oxidant status after two weeks of left lateral parietal TMS stimulation. Clinically our findings suggest that the left parietal region targeted rTMS application leads to significant improvement in familiarity-based cognition associated with the network connections between the left parietal region and the hippocampus.

Is there a dose-response relationship between musical instrument playing and later-life cognition? A cohort study using EPIC-Norfolk data

INTRODUCTION

Musical instrument playing provides intellectual stimulation, which is hypothesised to generate cognitive reserve that protects against cognitive impairment. Studies to date have classified musicianship as a binary entity. This investigation draws on the dataset of the European Prospective Investigation of Cancer Norfolk study to examine the effect of frequency of playing on later-life cognition.

METHODS

We compared three categorisations of self-reported musical playing frequency in late mid-life (12-month period) against cognitive performance measured after a 4-11 year delay, adjusted for relevant health and social confounders. Logistic regression models estimated the adjusted association between frequency of musical playing and the likelihood of being in the top and bottom cognitive deciles.

RESULTS

A total of 5,693 participants (745 musicians) provided data on music playing, cognition and all co-variables. Classification of musicianship by frequency of playing demonstrated key differences in socio-demographic factors. Musicians outperformed non-musicians in cognition generally. Compared with non-musicians, frequent musicians had 80% higher odds of being in the top cognitive decile (OR 1.80 [95% CI 1.19-2.73]), whereas musicians playing at any frequency had 29% higher odds (95% CI 1.03-1.62). There was evidence of a threshold effect, rather than a linear dose-response relationship.

DISCUSSION

This study supports a positive association between late mid-life musical instrument playing and later-life cognition, although causation cannot be assumed. Musicians playing frequently demonstrated the best cognition. 'Musicians' are a heterogeneous group and frequency of music playing seems a more informative measure than binary classification. Ideally, this more nuanced measure would be collected for different life course phases.

Frontotemporal dementia, music perception and social cognition share neurobiological circuits: A meta-analysis

Frontotemporal dementia (FTD) is a neurodegenerative disease that presents with profound changes in social cognition. Music might be a sensitive probe for social cognition abilities, but underlying neurobiological substrates are unclear. We performed a meta-analysis of voxel-based morphometry studies in FTD patients and functional MRI studies for music perception and social cognition tasks in cognitively normal controls to identify robust patterns of atrophy (FTD) or activation (music perception or social cognition). Conjunction analyses were performed to identify overlapping brain regions. In total 303 articles were included: 53 for FTD (n = 1153 patients, 42.5% female; 1337 controls, 53.8% female), 28 for music perception (n = 540, 51.8% female) and 222 for social cognition in controls (n = 5664, 50.2% female). We observed considerable overlap in atrophy patterns associated with FTD, and functional activation associated with music perception and social cognition, mostly encompassing the ventral language network. We further observed overlap across all three modalities in mesolimbic, basal forebrain and striatal regions. The results of our meta-analysis suggest that music perception and social cognition share neurobiological circuits that are affected in FTD. This supports the idea that music might be a sensitive probe for social cognition abilities with implications for diagnosis and monitoring.

Long-Term Music Exposure Prevents Age-Related Cognitive Deficits in Rats Independently of Hippocampal Neurogenesis

Cognitive decline appears across aging. While some studies report beneficial effects of musical listening and practice on cognitive aging, the underlying neurobiological mechanisms remain unknown. This study aims to determine whether chronic (6 h/day, 3 times/week) and long-lasting (4-8 months) music exposure, initiated at middle age in rats (15 months old), can influence behavioral parameters sensitive to age effects and reduce age-related spatial memory decline in rats. Spontaneous locomotor, circadian rhythmic activity, and anxiety-like behavior as well as spatial working and reference memory were assessed in 14-month-old rats and then after 4 and 8 months of music exposure (19 and 23 months old, respectively). Spatial learning and reference memory data were followed up by considering cognitive status of animals prior to music exposure (14 months old) given by K-means clustering of individual Z-score. Hippocampal cell proliferation and brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) level in the hippocampus and frontal cortex were measured. Results show that music exposure differentially rescues age-related deficits in spatial navigation tasks according to its duration without affecting spontaneous locomotor, circadian rhythmic activity, and anxiety-like behavior. Hippocampal cell proliferation as well as hippocampal and frontal cortex BDNF levels was not affected by music across aging. Cognitive improvement by music in aging rats may require distinct neurobiological mechanisms than hippocampal cell proliferation and BDNF.

Train the brain with music (TBM): brain plasticity and cognitive benefits induced by musical training in elderly people in Germany and Switzerland, a study protocol for an RCT comparing musical instrumental practice to sensitization to music

BACKGROUND

Recent data suggest that musical practice prevents age-related cognitive decline. But experimental evidence remains sparse and no concise information on the neurophysiological bases exists, although cognitive decline represents a major impediment to healthy aging. A challenge in the field of aging is developing training regimens that stimulate neuroplasticity and delay or reverse symptoms of cognitive and cerebral decline. To be successful, these regimens should be easily integrated in daily life and intrinsically motivating. This study combines for the first-time protocolled music practice in elderly with cutting-edge neuroimaging and behavioral approaches, comparing two types of musical education.

METHODS

We conduct a two-site Hannover-Geneva randomized intervention study in altogether 155 retired healthy elderly (64-78) years, (63 in Geneva, 92 in Hannover), offering either piano instruction (experimental group) or musical listening awareness (control group). Over 12 months all participants receive weekly training for 1 hour, and exercise at home for ~ 30 min daily. Both groups study different music styles. Participants are tested at 4 time points (0, 6, and 12 months & post-training (18 months)) on cognitive and perceptual-motor aptitudes as well as via wide-ranging functional and structural neuroimaging and blood sampling.

DISCUSSION

We aim to demonstrate positive transfer effects for faculties traditionally described to decline with age, particularly in the piano group: executive functions, working memory, processing speed, abstract thinking and fine motor skills. Benefits in both groups may show for verbal memory, hearing in noise and subjective well-being. In association with these behavioral benefits we anticipate functional and structural brain plasticity in temporal (medial and lateral), prefrontal and parietal areas and the basal ganglia. We intend exhibiting for the first time that musical activities can provoke important societal impacts by diminishing cognitive and perceptual-motor decline supported by functional and structural brain plasticity.

TRIAL REGISTRATION

The Ethikkomission of the Leibniz Universität Hannover approved the protocol on 14.08.17 (no. 3604-2017), the neuroimaging part and blood sampling was approved by the Hannover Medical School on 07.03.18. The full protocol was approved by the Commission cantonale d'éthique de la recherche de Genève (no. 2016-02224) on 27.02.18 and registered at clinicaltrials.gov on 17.09.18 ( NCT03674931 , no. 81185).

Do Musicians Have Better Mnemonic and Executive Performance Than Actors? Influence of Regular Musical or Theater Practice in Adults and in the Elderly

The effects of musical practice on cognition are well established yet rarely compared with other kinds of artistic training or expertise. This study aims to compare the possible effect of musical and theater regular practice on cognition across the lifespan. Both of these artistic activities require many hours of individual or collective training in order to reach an advanced level. This process requires the interaction between higher-order cognitive functions and several sensory modalities (auditory, verbal, visual and motor), as well as regular learning of new pieces. This study included participants with musical or theater practice, and healthy controls matched for age (18–84 years old) and education. The objective was to determine whether specific practice in these activities had an effect on cognition across the lifespan, and a protective influence against undesirable cognitive outcomes associated with aging. All participants underwent a battery of cognitive tasks that evaluated processing speed, executive function, fluency, working memory, verbal and visual long-term memories, and non-verbal reasoning abilities. Results showed that music and theater artistic practices were strongly associated with cognitive enhancements. Participants with musical practice were better in executive functioning, working memory and non-verbal reasoning, whereas participants with regular acting practice had better long-term verbal memory and fluency performance. Thus, taken together, results suggest a differential effect of these artistic practices on cognition across the lifespan. Advanced age did not seem to reduce the benefit, so future studies should focus on the hypothetical protective effects of artistic practice against cognitive decline.

Preservation of Musical Memory Throughout the Progression of Alzheimer's Disease? Toward a Reconciliation of Theoretical, Clinical, and Neuroimaging Evidence

Through this review of 25 clinical and experimental works on long-term musical memories in Alzheimer's disease (AD) patients, we attempt to clarify the conceptual understanding of musical memories, identify their evolution across the stages of the pathology, and propose possible explanations concerning the neural and cognitive mechanisms that underpin the preservation and impairment of certain musical memories. After clarifying the different kind of musical memories, we investigated their alterations throughout AD's progression from mild to severe stages. Both procedural and retrograde semantic memory seem relatively spared in AD, while episodic memory appears to be impaired early. Moreover, partial preservation of music encoding in AD can be revealed through paradigms that are especially designed for AD patients (relying on behavioral cues, using adapted settings, etc.). Although seldomly used, they would definitely help understanding the preserved capacities in every stage of AD. However, more research is needed to better understand this phenomenon and assess its specificity to music or other types of supports. These findings could lead to multiple applications in care settings and research designs, bringing more nuanced understanding of how long-term musical memory degrades throughout the course of AD, and should encourage us to prioritize patients' preserved cognitive abilities in current AD recreational and care programs.

Playing a musical instrument is associated with slower cognitive decline in community-dwelling older adults

BACKGROUND

Elucidating behavioral protective factors for cognitive decline and dementia can have a far-reaching impact.

AIMS

To describe the association of present and past musical instrument playing with cognitive function in cognitively intact older adults.

METHOD

A post hoc observational analysis of the Zurich Disability Prevention Trial. Past and present musical instrument playing was correlated with Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE) and EuroQol-Visual Analogue Scale (EQ-VAS) using linear regression at baseline and mixed-model linear regression over 1 year.

RESULTS

Two hundred community dwelling adults age 70 and older (mean age 77.7) were included. There were 48.5% (97/200) participants, who ever played a musical instrument; 35% (70/200) played in the past and 13.5% (27/200) played at present. At baseline, present players had a suggestively higher adjusted-MMSE than never players (28.9 vs. 28.5, p value 0.059). Over 12 months, compared to never players, ever players showed a significantly better improvement from baseline in adjusted-MMSE (0.29 vs. - 0.12, p value 0.007). The association remained significant even after restricting to participants without higher education (p value 0.03). Over time, no differences were observed for EQ-VAS (p value 0.45). However, past players had the largest decline in health-related quality of life at 12 months.

DISCUSSION

The support for a protective association in our observational study suggests the need for clinical trials to examine the effect of playing a musical instrument on cognitive function and decline. Both returning to play after an interruption and learning to play from the beginning should be examined.

CONCLUSIONS

Present and past musical instrument playing may assist in preserving cognitive function in community-dwelling older adults.

Occupational Neuroplasticity in the Human Brain: A Critical Review and Meta-Analysis of Neuroimaging Studies

Many studies have revealed the structural or functional brain changes induced by occupational factors. However, it remains largely unknown how occupation-related connectivity shapes the brain. In this paper, we denote occupational neuroplasticity as the neuroplasticity that takes place to satisfy the occupational requirements by extensively professional training and to accommodate the long-term, professional work of daily life, and a critical review of occupational neuroplasticity related to the changes in brain structure and functional networks has been primarily presented. Furthermore, meta-analysis revealed a neurophysiological mechanism of occupational neuroplasticity caused by professional experience. This meta-analysis of functional neuroimaging studies showed that experts displayed stronger activation in the left precentral gyrus [Brodmann area (BA)6], left middle frontal gyrus (BA6), and right inferior frontal gyrus (BA9) than novices, while meta-analysis of structural studies suggested that experts had a greater gray matter volume in the bilateral superior temporal gyrus (BA22) and right putamen than novices. Together, these findings not only expand the current understanding of the common neurophysiological basis of occupational neuroplasticity across different occupations and highlight some possible targets for neural modulation of occupational neuroplasticity but also provide a new perspective for occupational science research.

Recursive music elucidates neural mechanisms supporting the generation and detection of melodic hierarchies

The ability to generate complex hierarchical structures is a crucial component of human cognition which can be expressed in the musical domain in the form of hierarchical melodic relations. The neural underpinnings of this ability have been investigated by comparing the perception of well-formed melodies with unexpected sequences of tones. However, these contrasts do not target specifically the representation of rules generating hierarchical structure. Here, we present a novel paradigm in which identical melodic sequences are generated in four steps, according to three different rules: The Recursive rule, generating new hierarchical levels at each step; The Iterative rule, adding tones within a fixed hierarchical level without generating new levels; and a control rule that simply repeats the third step. Using fMRI, we compared brain activity across these rules when participants are imagining the fourth step after listening to the third (generation phase), and when participants listened to a fourth step (test sound phase), either well-formed or a violation. We found that, in comparison with Repetition and Iteration, imagining the fourth step using the Recursive rule activated the superior temporal gyrus (STG). During the test sound phase, we found fronto-temporo-parietal activity and hippocampal de-activation when processing violations, but no differences between rules. STG activation during the generation phase suggests that generating new hierarchical levels from previous steps might rely on retrieving appropriate melodic hierarchy schemas. Previous findings highlighting the role of hippocampus and inferior frontal gyrus may reflect processing of unexpected melodic sequences, rather than hierarchy generation per se.

Structural Covariance Changes of Anterior and Posterior Hippocampus During Musical Training in Young Adults

Musical training can induce the functional and structural changes of the hippocampus. The hippocampus is not a homogeneous structure which can be divided into anterior and posterior parts along its longitudinal axis, and the whole-brain structural covariances of anterior (aHC) and posterior hippocampus (pHC) show distinct patterns in young adults. However, little is known about whether the anterior and posterior hippocampal structural covariances change after long-term musical training. Here, we investigated the musical training-induced changes of the whole-brain structural covariances of bilateral aHC and pHC in a longitudinal designed experiment with two groups (training group and control group) across three time points [the beginning (TP1) and the end (TP2) of 24 weeks of training, and 12 weeks after training (TP3)]. Using seed partial least square, we identified two significant patterns of structural covariance of the aHC and pHC. The first showed common structural covariance of the aHC and pHC. The second pattern revealed distinct structural covariance of the two regions and reflected the changes of structural covariance of the left pHC in the training group across three time points: the left pHC showed significant structural covariance with bilateral hippocampus and parahippocampal gyrus, left calcarine sulcus only at TP1 and TP3. Furthermore, the integrity of distinct structural networks of aHC and pHC in the second pattern significantly increased in the training group. Our findings suggest that musical training could change the organization of structural whole-brain covariance for left pHC and enhance the degree of the structural covariance network differentiation of the aHC and pHC in young adults.

Music Education at School: Too Little and Too Late? Evidence From a Longitudinal Study on Music Training in Preadolescents

It is widely believed that intensive music training can boost cognitive and visuo-motor skills. However, this evidence is primarily based on retrospective studies; this makes it difficult to determine whether a cognitive advantage is caused by the intensive music training, or it is instead a factor influencing the choice of starting a music curriculum. To address these issues in a highly ecological setting, we tested longitudinally 128 students of a Middle School in Milan, at the beginning of the first class and, 1 year later, at the beginning of the second class. 72 students belonged to a Music curriculum (30 with previous music experience and 42 without) and 56 belonged to a Standard curriculum (44 with prior music experience and 12 without). Using a Principal Component Analysis, all the cognitive measures were grouped in four high-order factors, reflecting (a) General Cognitive Abilities, (b) Speed of Linguistic Elaboration, (c) Accuracy in Reading and Memory tests, and (d) Visuospatial and numerical skills. The longitudinal comparison of the four groups of students revealed that students from the Music curriculum had better performance in tests tackling General Cognitive Abilities, Visuospatial skills, and Accuracy in Reading and Memory tests. However, there were no significant curriculum-by-time interactions. Finally, the decision to have a musical experience before entering middle school was more likely to occur when the cultural background of the families was a high one. We conclude that a combination of family-related variables, early music experience, and pre-existent cognitive make-up is a likely explanation for the decision to enter a music curriculum at middle school.

Motor repertoire and gray matter plasticity: Is there a link?

There is a considerable amount of evidence sustaining that aerobic exercise causes positive modifications in gray matter density (GMD), especially in the hippocampus and anterior cingulate cortex. However, recent experimental researches with motor learning paradigms are consistently showing that increasing cardiorespiratory capacity is not the only mechanism able to promote positive outcomes in GMD with exercise. In the present study, we present a theoretical suggestion that expanding one's motor repertoire is another primary mechanism related to the increases in GMD. Motor repertoire can be understood as the number of movement possibilities and motor skills that can be performed by a person. Supporting our suggestion, professional athletes present higher GMD than controls, and experimental protocols repeatedly observes positive changes in GMD following motor learning. The relationship between physical inactivity, amputation, and lower GMD values also gives further support for the hypothesis. Follow-up studies monitoring GMD before and after training programs that stimulate new motor skill learning are essential to confirm this proposition. The brain regions related to sensory processing of the motor tasks and the cortical areas related to motor control (e.g., primary motor cortex, supplementary motor area) are probably the ones most affected by plastic changes. If the hypothesis turns out to be reliable, dancing, gymnastics, and other movement-rich activities are thoroughly encouraged for this purpose. Therefore, this approach might be used to attenuate GMD loss related to aging or another condition, such as Parkinson's and Alzheimer's.

Music-performance regulates microRNAs in professional musicians

Musical training and performance require precise integration of multisensory and motor centres of the human brain and can be regarded as an epigenetic modifier of brain functions. Numerous studies have identified structural and functional differences between the brains of musicians and non-musicians and superior cognitive functions in musicians. Recently, music-listening and performance has also been shown to affect the regulation of several genes, many of which were identified in songbird singing. MicroRNAs affect gene regulation and studying their expression may give new insights into the epigenetic effect of music. Here, we studied the effect of 2 hours of classical music-performance on the peripheral blood microRNA expressions in professional musicians with respect to a control activity without music for the same duration. As detecting transcriptomic changes in the functional human brain remains a challenge for geneticists, we used peripheral blood to study music-performance induced microRNA changes and interpreted the results in terms of potential effects on brain function, based on the current knowledge about the microRNA function in blood and brain. We identified significant (FDR <0.05) up-regulation of five microRNAs; hsa-miR-3909, hsa-miR-30d-5p, hsa-miR-92a-3p, hsa-miR-222-3p and hsa-miR-30a-5p; and down-regulation of two microRNAs; hsa-miR-6803-3p and hsa-miR-1249-3p. hsa-miR-222-3p and hsa-miR-92a-3p putatively target FOXP2, which was found down-regulated by microRNA regulation in songbird singing. miR-30d and miR-222 corroborate microRNA response observed in zebra finch song-listening/learning. miR-222 is induced by ERK cascade, which is important for memory formation, motor neuron functions and neuronal plasticity. miR-222 is also activated by FOSL1, an immediate early gene from the FOS family of transcriptional regulators which are activated by auditory-motor stimuli. miR-222 and miR-92 promote neurite outgrowth by negatively regulating the neuronal growth inhibitor, PTEN, and by activating CREB expression and phosphorylation. The up-regulation of microRNAs previously found to be regulators of auditory and nervous system functions (miR-30d, miR-92a and miR-222) is indicative of the sensory perception processes associated with music-performance. Akt signalling pathway which has roles in cell survival, cell differentiation, activation of CREB signalling and dopamine transmission was one of the functions regulated by the up-regulated microRNAs; in accordance with functions identified from songbird learning. The up-regulated microRNAs were also found to be regulators of apoptosis, suggesting repression of apoptotic mechanisms in connection with music-performance. Furthermore, comparative analyses of the target genes of differentially expressed microRNAs with that of the song-responsive microRNAs in songbirds suggest convergent regulatory mechanisms underlying auditory perception.

The functional neuroanatomy of musical memory in Alzheimer's disease

Background

Memory for music has attracted much recent interest in Alzheimer's disease but the underlying brain mechanisms have not been defined in patients directly. Here we addressed this issue in an Alzheimer's disease cohort using activation fMRI of two core musical memory systems.

Methods

We studied 34 patients with younger onset Alzheimer's disease led either by episodic memory decline (typical Alzheimer's disease) or by visuospatial impairment (posterior cortical atrophy) in relation to 19 age-matched healthy individuals. We designed a novel fMRI paradigm based on passive listening to melodies that were either previously familiar or unfamiliar (musical semantic memory) and either presented singly or repeated (incidental musical episodic memory).

Results

Both syndromic groups showed significant functional neuroanatomical alterations relative to the healthy control group. For musical semantic memory, disease-associated activation group differences were localised to right inferior frontal cortex (reduced activation in the group with memory-led Alzheimer's disease); while for incidental musical episodic memory, disease-associated activation group differences were localised to precuneus and posterior cingulate cortex (abnormally enhanced activation in the syndromic groups). In post-scan behavioural testing, both patient groups had a deficit of musical episodic memory relative to healthy controls whereas musical semantic memory was unimpaired.

Conclusions

Our findings define functional neuroanatomical substrates for the differential involvement of musical semantic and incidental episodic memory in major phenotypes of Alzheimer's disease. The complex dynamic profile of brain activation group differences observed suggests that musical memory may be an informative probe of neural network function in Alzheimer's disease. These findings may guide the development of future musical interventions in dementia.

Musical memory and hippocampus revisited: Evidence from a musical layperson with highly selective hippocampal damage

The role of the human hippocampus for musical memory is still unclear. While imaging studies in healthy humans have repeatedly shown hippocampal activation in musical memory tasks, studies in musicians with chronic bilateral medial temporal lobe damage and in non-musicians suffering from neuro-degenerative diseases suggest that musical memory may at least partly be independent of hippocampal integrity. Here, we report on a musical layperson who acutely developed an amnesic syndrome in the context of autoimmune encephalitis. Structural and resting state functional MRI revealed exceptionally selective bilateral lesions of the hippocampi and altered functional connectivity with retrosplenial cortex and precuneus. Neuropsychological testing showed a severe global amnesic syndrome. Perception and processing of scales, melodic contours, intervals, rhythms and meter were unaffected. Most notably, the patient performed completely normally on tests of recognition memory for unfamiliar melodies and excerpts of complex musical material, while recognition memory for visual and verbal information was severely impaired. Likewise, emotional evaluation of musical excerpts did not differ from controls. We infer that integrity of musical processing and recognition memory in patients with hippocampal dysfunction does not result from training-induced or post-lesional brain plasticity, but rather reflects integrity of brain networks outside the hippocampi and presumably also outside retrosplenial cortex and precuneus. Our findings suggest major differences in the neural substrates of musical and non-musical recognition memory.

Do musicians learn a fine sequential hand motor skill differently than non-musicians?

Do professional musicians learn a fine sequential hand motor skill more efficiently than non-musicians? Is this also the case when they perform motor imagery, which implies that they only mentally simulate these movements? Musicians and non-musicians performed a Go/NoGo discrete sequence production (DSP) task, which allows to separate sequence-specific from a-specific learning effects. In this task five stimuli, to be memorized during a preparation interval, signaled a response sequence. In a practice phase, different response sequences had to be either executed, imagined, or inhibited, which was indicated by different response cues. In a test phase, responses were required to familiar (previously executed, imagined, or inhibited) and unfamiliar sequences. In both phases, response times and response accuracy were measured while the electroencephalogram (EEG) was only registered during the practice phase to compare activity between motor imagery, motor execution, and motor inhibition for both groups. Results in the practice phase revealed that musicians learned the response sequences faster and more accurately than non-musicians although no difference in initiation time was found. EEG analyses revealed similar lateralized activity during learning a motor skill for both groups. Our results from the test phase showed better sequence-a-specific learning effects (i.e., faster response times and increased accuracy) for musicians than for non-musicians. Moreover, we revealed that non-musicians benefit more from physical execution while learning a required motor sequence, whereas sequence-specific learning effects due to learning with motor imagery were very similar for musicians and non-musicians.

Music processing in preterm and full-term newborns: A psychophysiological interaction (PPI) approach in neonatal fMRI

Neonatal Intensive Care Units (NICU) provide special equipment designed to give life support for the increasing number of prematurely born infants and assure their survival. More recently NICU's strive to include developmentally oriented care and modulate sensory input for preterm infants. Music, among other sensory stimuli, has been introduced into NICUs, but without knowledge on the basic music processing in the brain of preterm infants. In this study, we explored the cortico-subcortical music processing of different types of conditions (Original music, Tempo modification, Key transposition) in newborns shortly after birth to assess the effective connectivity of the primary auditory cortex with the entire newborn brain. Additionally, we investigated if early exposure during NICU stay modulates brain processing of music in preterm infants at term equivalent age. We approached these two questions using Psychophysiological Interaction (PPI) analyses. A group of preterm infants listened to music (Original music) starting from 33 weeks postconceptional age until term equivalent age and were compared to two additional groups without music intervention; preterm infants and full-term newborns. Auditory cortex functional connectivity with cerebral regions known to be implicated in tempo and familiarity processing were identified only for preterm infants with music training in the NICU. Increased connectivity between auditory cortices and thalamus and dorsal striatum may not only reflect their sensitivity to the known music and the processing of its tempo as familiar, but these results are also compatible with the hypothesis that the previously listened music induces a more arousing and pleasant state. Our results suggest that music exposure in NICU's environment can induce brain functional connectivity changes that are associated with music processing.

Potential Cognitive Benefits From Playing Music Among Cognitively Intact Older Adults: A Scoping Review

The aging population is growing rapidly, raising rates of cognitive impairment, which makes strategies for protection against cognitive impairment increasingly important. There is little evidence indicating highly effective interventions preventing or slowing onset of cognitive impairment. Music playing influences brain and cognitive function, activating multiple brain areas and using cognitive and motor functions as well as multiple sensory systems, simultaneously. The purpose of this study was to review the current evidence related to playing a musical instrument being a potentially protective mechanism against cognitive decline among older adults. Using scoping review procedures, four databases were searched. Paired reviewers analyzed articles for content, design, and bias. Eleven studies met study criteria and were included in the review. All studies showed that music playing was correlated with positive outcomes on cognitive ability; more high-quality research is needed in this area to understand mechanisms behind potential cognitive protection of music.

The Anatomical Basis for Dystonia: The Motor Network Model

Background

The dystonias include a clinically and etiologically very diverse group of disorders. There are both degenerative and non-degenerative subtypes resulting from genetic or acquired causes. Traditionally, all dystonias have been viewed as disorders of the basal ganglia. However, there has been increasing appreciation for involvement of other brain regions including the cerebellum, thalamus, midbrain, and cortex. Much of the early evidence for these other brain regions has come from studies of animals, but multiple recent studies have been done with humans, in an effort to confirm or refute involvement of these other regions. The purpose of this article is to review the new evidence from animals and humans regarding the motor network model, and to address the issues important to translational neuroscience.

Methods

The English literature was reviewed for articles relating to the neuroanatomical basis for various types of dystonia in both animals and humans.

Results

There is evidence from both animals and humans that multiple brain regions play an important role in various types of dystonia. The most direct evidence for specific brain regions comes from animal studies using pharmacological, lesion, or genetic methods. In these studies, experimental manipulations of specific brain regions provide direct evidence for involvement of the basal ganglia, cerebellum, thalamus and other regions. Additional evidence also comes from human studies using neuropathological, neuroimaging, non-invasive brain stimulation, and surgical interventions. In these studies, the evidence is less conclusive, because discriminating the regions that cause dystonia from those that reflect secondary responses to abnormal movements is more challenging.

Discussion

Overall, the evidence from both animals and humans suggests that different regions may play important roles in different subtypes of dystonia. The evidence so far provides strong support for the motor network model. There are obvious challenges, but also advantages, of attempting to translate knowledge gained from animals into a more complete understanding of human dystonia and novel therapeutic strategies.

Musical Expertise Increases Top-Down Modulation Over Hippocampal Activation during Familiarity Decisions

The hippocampus has classically been associated with episodic memory, but is sometimes also recruited during semantic memory tasks, especially for the skilled exploration of familiar information. Cognitive control mechanisms guiding semantic memory search may benefit from the set of cognitive processes at stake during musical training. Here, we examined using functional magnetic resonance imaging, whether musical expertise would promote the top–down control of the left inferior frontal gyrus (LIFG) over the generation of hippocampally based goal-directed thoughts mediating the familiarity judgment of proverbs and musical items. Analyses of behavioral data confirmed that musical experts more efficiently access familiar melodies than non-musicians although such increased ability did not transfer to verbal semantic memory. At the brain level, musical expertise specifically enhanced the recruitment of the hippocampus during semantic access to melodies, but not proverbs. Additionally, hippocampal activation contributed to speed of access to familiar melodies, but only in musicians. Critically, causal modeling of neural dynamics between LIFG and the hippocampus further showed that top–down excitatory regulation over the hippocampus during familiarity decision specifically increases with musical expertise – an effect that generalized across melodies and proverbs. At the local level, our data show that musical expertise modulates the online recruitment of hippocampal response to serve semantic memory retrieval of familiar melodies. The reconfiguration of memory network dynamics following musical training could constitute a promising framework to understand its ability to preserve brain functions.

Music training is associated with cortical synchronization reflected in EEG coherence during verbal memory encoding

Music training can improve cognitive functions. Previous studies have shown that children and adults with music training demonstrate better verbal learning and memory performance than those without such training. Although prior studies have shown an association between music training and changes in the structural and functional organization of the brain, there is no concrete evidence of the underlying neural correlates of the verbal memory encoding phase involved in such enhanced memory performance. Therefore, we carried out an electroencephalography (EEG) study to investigate how music training was associated with brain activity during the verbal memory encoding phase. Sixty participants were recruited, 30 of whom had received music training for at least one year (the MT group) and 30 of whom had never received music training (the NMT group). The participants in the two groups were matched for age, education, gender distribution, and cognitive capability. Their verbal and visual memory functions were assessed using standardized neuropsychological tests and EEG was used to record their brain activity during the verbal memory encoding phase. Consistent with previous studies, the MT group demonstrated better verbal memory than the NMT group during both the learning and the delayed recall trials in the paper-and-pencil tests. The MT group also exhibited greater learning capacity during the learning trials. Compared with the NMT group, the MT group showed an increase in long-range left and right intrahemispheric EEG coherence in the theta frequency band during the verbal memory encoding phase. In addition, their event-related left intrahemispheric theta coherence was positively associated with subsequent verbal memory performance as measured by discrimination scores. These results suggest that music training may modulate the cortical synchronization of the neural networks involved in verbal memory formation.

Functional and Structural Neuroplasticity Induced by Short-Term Tactile Training Based on Braille Reading

Neuroplastic changes induced by sensory learning have been recognized within the cortices of specific modalities as well as within higher ordered multimodal areas. The interplay between these areas is not fully understood, particularly in the case of somatosensory learning. Here we examined functional and structural changes induced by short-term tactile training based of Braille reading, a task that requires both significant tactile expertise and mapping of tactile input onto multimodal representations. Subjects with normal vision were trained for 3 weeks to read Braille exclusively by touch and scanned before and after training, while performing a same-different discrimination task on Braille characters and meaningless characters. Functional and diffusion-weighted magnetic resonance imaging sequences were used to assess resulting changes. The strongest training-induced effect was found in the primary somatosensory cortex (SI), where we observed bilateral augmentation in activity accompanied by an increase in fractional anisotropy (FA) within the contralateral SI. Increases of white matter fractional anisotropy were also observed in the secondary somatosensory area (SII) and the thalamus. Outside of somatosensory system, changes in both structure and function were found in i.e., the fusiform gyrus, the medial frontal gyri and the inferior parietal lobule. Our results provide evidence for functional remodeling of the somatosensory pathway and higher ordered multimodal brain areas occurring as a result of short-lasting tactile learning, and add to them a novel picture of extensive white matter plasticity.

Dance Experience and Associations with Cortical Gray Matter Thickness in the Aging Population

INTRODUCTION

We investigated the effect dance experience may have on cortical gray matter thickness and cognitive performance in elderly participants with and without mild cognitive impairment (MCI).

METHODS

39 cognitively normal and 48 MCI elderly participants completed a questionnaire regarding their lifetime experience with music, dance, and song. Participants identified themselves as either dancers or nondancers. All participants received structural 1.5-tesla MRI scans and detailed clinical and neuropsychological evaluations. An advanced 3D cortical mapping technique was then applied to calculate cortical thickness.

RESULTS

Despite having a trend-level significantly thinner cortex, dancers performed better in cognitive tasks involving learning and memory, such as the California Verbal Learning Test-II (CVLT-II) short delay free recall (p = 0.004), the CVLT-II long delay free recall (p = 0.003), and the CVLT-II learning over trials 1-5 (p = 0.001).

DISCUSSION

Together, these results suggest that dance may result in an enhancement of cognitive reserve in aging, which may help avert or delay MCI.

Altered intrinsic connectivity of the auditory cortex in congenital amusia

Congenital amusia, a neurodevelopmental disorder of music perception and production, has been associated with abnormal anatomical and functional connectivity in a right frontotemporal pathway. To investigate whether spontaneous connectivity in brain networks involving the auditory cortex is altered in the amusic brain, we ran a seed-based connectivity analysis, contrasting at-rest functional MRI data of amusic and matched control participants. Our results reveal reduced frontotemporal connectivity in amusia during resting state, as well as an overconnectivity between the auditory cortex and the default mode network (DMN). The findings suggest that the auditory cortex is intrinsically more engaged toward internal processes and less available to external stimuli in amusics compared with controls. Beyond amusia, our findings provide new evidence for the link between cognitive deficits in pathology and abnormalities in the connectivity between sensory areas and the DMN at rest.

Structural and functional plasticity specific to musical training with wind instruments

Numerous neuroimaging studies have shown structural and functional changes resulting from musical training. Among these studies, changes in primary sensory areas are mostly related to motor functions. In this study, we looked for some similar functional and structural changes in other functional modalities, such as somatosensory function, by examining the effects of musical training with wind instruments. We found significant changes in two aspects of neuroplasticity, cortical thickness, and resting-state neuronal networks. A group of subjects with several years of continuous musical training and who are currently playing in university wind ensembles showed differences in cortical thickness in lip- and tongue-related brain areas vs. non-music playing subjects. Cortical thickness in lip-related brain areas was significantly thicker and that in tongue-related areas was significantly thinner in the music playing group compared with that in the non-music playing group. Association analysis of lip-related areas in the music playing group showed that the increase in cortical thickness was caused by musical training. In addition, seed-based correlation analysis showed differential activation in the precentral gyrus and supplementary motor areas (SMA) between the music and non-music playing groups. These results suggest that high-intensity training with specific musical instruments could induce structural changes in related anatomical areas and could also generate a new functional neuronal network in the brain.

Cognitive Expertise: An ALE Meta-Analysis

Expert performance constitutes the endpoint of skill acquisition and is accompanied by widespread neuroplastic changes. To reveal common mechanisms of reorganization associated with long-term expertise in a cognitive domain (mental calculation, chess, language, memory, music without motor involvement), we used activation likelihood estimation meta-analysis and compared brain activation of experts to nonexperts. Twenty-six studies matched inclusion criteria, most of which reported an increase and not a decrease of activation foci in experts. Increased activation occurred in the left rolandic operculum (OP 4) and left primary auditory cortex and in bilateral premotor cortex in studies that used auditory stimulation. In studies with visual stimulation, experts showed enhanced activation in the right inferior parietal cortex (area PGp) and the right lingual gyrus. Experts' brain activation patterns seem to be characterized by enhanced or additional activity in domain-specific primary, association, and motor structures, confirming that learning is localized and very specialized.

The Influence of Pre-stimulus EEG Activity on Reaction Time During a Verbal Sternberg Task is Related to Musical Expertise

Previous work highlighted the possibility that musical training has an influence on cognitive functioning. The suggested reason for this influence is the strong recruitment of attention, planning, and working memory functions during playing a musical instrument. The purpose of the present work was twofold, namely to evaluate the general relationship between pre-stimulus electrophysiological activity and cognition, and more specifically the influence of musical expertise on working memory functions. With this purpose in mind, we used covariance mapping analyses to evaluate whether pre-stimulus electroencephalographic activity is predictive for reaction time during a visual working memory task (Sternberg paradigm) in musicians and non-musicians. In line with our hypothesis, we replicated previous findings pointing to a general predictive value of pre-stimulus activity for working memory performance. Most importantly, we also provide first evidence for an influence of musical expertise on working memory performance that could distinctively be predicted by pre-stimulus spectral power. Our results open novel perspectives for better comprehending the vast influences of musical expertise on cognition.