Amnesia & Hippocampus: BBS Call for Commentators

Below is the abstract of a forthcoming BBS target article on: EPISODIC MEMORY, AMNESIA AND THE HIPPOCAMPAL/ANTERIOR-THALAMIC AXIS by John P. Aggleton & Malcolm W. Brown This article has been accepted for publication in Behavioral and Brain Sciences (BBS), an international, interdisciplinary journal providing Open Peer Commentary on important and controversial current research in the biobehavioral and cognitive sciences. Commentators must be BBS Associates or nominated by a BBS Associate. To be considered as a commentator for this article, to suggest other appropriate commentators, or for information about how to become a BBS Associate, please send EMAIL to: bbs(a)cogsci.soton.ac.uk or write to: Behavioral and Brain Sciences Department of Psychology University of Southampton Highfield, Southampton SO17 1BJ UNITED KINGDOM http://www.princeton.edu/~harnad/bbs/ http://www.cogsci.soton.ac.uk/bbs/ ftp://ftp.princeton.edu/pub/harnad/BBS/ ftp://ftp.cogsci.soton.ac.uk/pub/bbs/ gopher://gopher.princeton.edu:70/11/.libraries/.pujournals If you are not a BBS Associate, please send your CV and the name of a BBS Associate (there are currently over 10,000 worldwide) who is familiar with your work. All past BBS authors, referees and commentators are eligible to become BBS Associates. To help us put together a balanced list of commentators, please give some indication of the aspects of the topic on which you would bring your areas of expertise to bear if you were selected as a commentator. An electronic draft of the full text is available for inspection with a WWW browser, anonymous ftp or gopher according to the instructions that follow after the abstract. ____________________________________________________________________ EPISODIC MEMORY, AMNESIA AND THE HIPPOCAMPAL/ANTERIOR-THALAMIC AXIS John P. Aggleton School of Psychology Cardiff University PO Box 901 Cardiff CF1 3YG Wales aggleton(a)cardiff.ac.uk Malcolm W. Brown Department of Anatomy University of Bristol University Walk Bristol BS8 1TD U.K. m.w.brown(a)bristol.ac.uk KEYWORDS: amnesia, memory, hippocampus, fornix, thalamus, temporal cortex ABSTRACT: Based on new information from both clinical and experimental studies in animals (lesion, electrophysiological, and gene-activation), the anatomy underlying anterograde amnesia is reformulated. The distinction between temporal lobe and diencephalic amnesia is of limited value because a common feature of anterograde amnesia is damage to part of an 'extended hippocampal system' comprising the hippocampus, the fornix, the mamillary bodies and the anterior thalamic nuclei. This view, which can be traced back to Delay and Brion (1969), differs from other recent models in placing critical importance on the efferents from the hippocampus via the fornix to the diencephalon. These are necessary for the encoding and hence the effective subsequent recall of episodic memory. An additional feature of this hippocampal/anterior-thalamic axis is the presence of projections back from the diencephalon to the temporal cortex and hippocampus that also support episodic memory. In contrast, this hippocampal system is not required for tests of item recognition that primarily tax familiarity judgements. Familiarity judgements reflect an independent process that depends on a distinct system involving the perirhinal cortex of the temporal lobe and the medial dorsal nucleus of the thalamus. In the large majority of amnesic cases, both the hippocampal/anterior-thalamic and the perirhinal/ mediodorsal-thalamic systems are compromised, leading to severe deficits in both recall and recognition. -------------------------------------------------------------- To help you decide whether you would be an appropriate commentator for this article, an electronic draft is retrievable from the World Wide Web or by anonymous ftp or gopher from the US or UK BBS Archive. Ftp instructions follow below. Please do not prepare a commentary on this draft. Just let us know, after having inspected it, what relevant expertise you feel you would bring to bear on what aspect of the article. The URLs you can use to get to the BBS Archive: http://www.princeton.edu/~harnad/bbs/ http://www.cogsci.soton.ac.uk/bbs/Archive/bbs.aggleton.html ftp://ftp.princeton.edu/pub/harnad/BBS/bbs.aggleton ftp://ftp.cogsci.soton.ac.uk/pub/bbs/Archive/bbs.aggleton gopher://gopher.princeton.edu:70/11/.libraries/.pujournals To retrieve a file by ftp from an Internet site, type either: ftp ftp.princeton.edu or ftp 128.112.128.1 When you are asked for your login, type: anonymous Enter password as queried (your password is your actual userid: yourlogin(a)yourhost.whatever.whatever - be sure to include the "@") cd /pub/harnad/BBS To show the available files, type: ls Next, retrieve the file you want with (for example): get bbs.aggleton When you have the file(s) you want, type: quit