First proof of living memory trace found

PITTSBURGH, Nov. 14 (UPI) -- A Pittsburgh scientist says researchers have detected a memory trace in an animal after it has encountered a single, new stimulus.

The research, done with honeybees sensing new odors, allows neuroscientists to peer within the living brain and explore short-term memory as never before, according to Roberto Fernandez Galan, a postdoctoral research associate at Carnegie Mellon University.

"Our findings show an odor produces a memory trace of synchronized neural activity that lasts several minutes after a bee initially senses it," said Galan. "This is the first time anyone has revealed a short-term, stimulus-specific neural pulse within the living brain that occurs after exposure to a previously unknown stimulus."

The report supports Hebb's theory of learning, a 55-year-old proposition that "neurons that fire together wire together." According to the theory, a stimulus activates some neurons while inhibiting others. Once the stimulus is removed, traces of the excitation/inhibition pattern should remain.

A future question that could be addressed using this research is how short-term memory gets encoded as long-term memory over time, said Galan.

The findings are scheduled for January publication in Neural Computation.