Methods - Test 1 - Learning And Memory

Front 1

Commonly used tasks to assess learning and memory in rodent models

Back 1

"Maze tasks: Radial-arm maze, Morris water maze, T-maze, Plus maze, Barnes maze

Conditioning tasks: Fear conditioning, place preference

Other:Object memory tasks, Social transmission of food preference
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Front 2

Radial-Arm Maze

Back 2

"
Natural foragers
Normally doesn’t return quickly to where they have been

Make more difficult
Pick 4 hrs – lapse 1 hr – back in – will check 4 arms hasn’t gone

"

Front 3

"Working vs. Reference Memory

defs and examples"

Back 3

"Working memory – information useful for a single trial or session

Reference memory – information useful across trials or sessions


Working memory – parking spot at the grocery store

Reference memory – atm code, ‘rules of the game’, don’t park in handicap parking space

"

Front 4

Working & Reference memory in Radial Arm maze

Back 4

"working memory error: Re-entry into an arm that was baited.

Reference memory error: Entry into an arm that is never baited.

"

Front 5

Spatial vs nonspatial

Back 5

"Spatial – use of extra-maze cues to form “cognitive map” to navigate through environment

Non-spatial – use of nonspatial cues or landmarks (floors different, sandpaper, plexiglass)
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Front 6

"once-baited arm

radial arm"

Back 6

all maze arms are baited once, and the rat must visit each without a repetition

Front 7

"once-baited and never baited arm

radial arm"

Back 7

"only half the arms are baited once and the other half are never baited

Rats learn to visit each baited arm once per trial and never to visit the unbaited arms."

Front 8

"non-spacial

radial arm"

Back 8

"The nonspatial version of the radial arm task.

Each arm has a different surface on the floor and the arms are interchased randomly b/w trials. Rats learn to visit each cute once per trial.
"

Front 9

Who created the water maze?

Back 9

Richard Morris

Front 10

parts of the water maze

Back 10

"excape platform

opaque water"

Front 11

measuring data from water maze

Back 11

"computerized.

Use path length, before it was latency."

Front 12

Water maze - memory processes

Back 12

"Place training (reference memory)

Matching-to-place (working memory)

Probe trials – what have they learned?

Spatial vs. nonspatial
"

Front 13

"water maze

place training"

Back 13

"reference memory

Most typical water maze technique.
Put animal in different spots for each trial - if do, learn to swim to right. Trying to have them learn spacial cues.

After 90 secs if they can’t find maze, guide them to it.

"

Front 14

"water maze

matching-to-place"

Back 14

"working memory

Move platform each day

Multiple trials each day – platform stays same place all day. Time lapse between trials – 1, 2 hrs (or longer)

Look at aging, etc

This can be done indefinately.


"

Front 15

"water maze

probe trial

*********"

Back 15

"remove platform & see what they have learned.

Either learned a location

OR learned a searching strategy

do after 8-10 trials"

Front 16

measuring spatial memory

Back 16

"remove platform and see if they look for the platform in the same area
"

Front 17

measuring non spatical memory

Back 17

"2 platforms & visually different

Grey is a fake, white is real. Has to learn that white is the real one. Platforms move & have to remember to go to white one. "

Front 18

thigmotaxis

Back 18

"stress response - hugs the walls to get to the platform.

a non-mnemonic variable that can affect performance in the water maze

lower the temp of water - higher anxiety (remove sex differences)

difference between M and F"

Front 19

Barnes Maze

Back 19

"circle with holes. One hole has an excape area.

Can do same thing as water maze.

Can configure to test working or reference memory, spatial or nonspatial
"

Front 20

T-maze alternation task

Back 20

"can be used to test working memory

Can configure to test working or reference memory, spatial or nonspatial

Train to Criterion (9 correct in 10 trials)"

Front 21

"T-maze

difference b/w response & place"

Back 21

"response (turn right) (habit)

place (based on spatial cues)

probe - rotate maze 180 degrees"

Front 22

"T-maze

brain regions & response & place"

Back 22

"rats like to alternate in the t maze - like new things.

Will they remember where they have been?

place - hippocampus

response - striatum"

Front 23

Fear conditioning

Back 23

"Following the pairing of a neutral stimulus with an aversive stumulus, the neutral stimulus elicits the cluster of behaviors related to the fear state.
"

Front 24

Fear conditioning procedure

Back 24

"After training in Context A, subject’s level of freezing behavior is recorded after a retention delay.
"

Front 25

Contextual Conditioning

Back 25

"In a contextual conditioning experiment, subjects are returned to the Context A to measure their freezing in the same context.
"

Front 26

Cued conditioning

Back 26

In a cued conditioning experiment, subjects are placed in a novel context, and freezing behavior is examined with and without a fear-associated cue.

Front 27

what brain region does contextual conditioning affect?

Back 27

hippocampus

Front 28

Conditioned Place Preference

Back 28

"In a Conditioned Place Preference task, the animal learns an association between an environment with distinctive cues and a positive reinforcer.

It is often used as an animal model of the subjective effects of drugs.
"

Front 29

CPP overview

Back 29

"shoebox partitioned & decorated differently. One side striped, other spots

Should have no natural preference to either side

CPP measures if drug has reward (or negative) properties. Used for drug abuse research.
"

Front 30

object memory

Back 30

"object recognition

object placement

rats like novelty."

Front 31

social transmission of food preference

Back 31

"demonstrator eats cinnomon, exchange of information (smells others breath), the 2nd rat has choice

lace rat chow with cinnomen

memory test b/c insert delay to test memory"

Front 32

Karl Lashley

Back 32

"Cortical knife cuts made by Lasley to disrupt learned associations

His conclusion: memory storage is not localized within the cortex"

Front 33

Lashley's Law of Equipotentiality

Back 33

"All areas of the cortex contribute equally to memory storage.
"

Front 34

what we learned from HM

Back 34

"there is an area in the brain more important than others regarding memory: hippocampus and surrounding medial temporal lobe

(Lashley was wrong)"

Front 35

how did this happen to HM

Back 35

had severe epilepsy, removed hippocampus

Front 36

what we learned from HM shows. . .

Back 36

what is important for the hippocampus

Front 37

HM - selective impairment

Back 37

"Specific to memory; perceptual, motor and cognitive functions intact
Selective to specific types of memory

NOT a global impairment
"

Front 38

anterograde amnesia

Back 38

after hippocampus removed

Front 39

retrograde amnesia

Back 39

before surgery

Front 40

"HM had:

regarding:
anterograde amnesia
retrograde amnesia
remote memory
immediate memory"

Back 40

"Severe deficit in the ability to make new declarative memories

Severe anterograde amnesia (no new memories after hippo removed)
Some temporally graded retrograde amnesia (before surgery)
Intact remote memory
Intact immediate memory (could hold a conversation, as soon as distracted, would forget)
"

Front 41

learning and memory abilities that were spared

Back 41

"He could still learn new things. . . Mirror drawing & tower of Hanoi
Got better at it, but no memory of having done it.
"

Front 42

"Properties of a valid animal model of the human amnesia syndrome:

Sensory, motivational and cognitive processes _________

Immediate or short-term memory _________

Severe _________ amnesia

Deficit should be _________ in scope

Temporally graded _________ amnesia

Evidence of _________ learning domains
"

Back 42

"Sensory, motivational and cognitive processes intact

Immediate or short-term memory intact

Severe anterograde amnesia or rapid forgetting

Deficit should be global in scope – that is the impairment should span sensory and conceptual modalities of new learning

Temporally graded retrograde amnesia

Evidence of spared learning domains: some things that can do, some can’t (like HM)
"

Front 43

"setting up an animal model:

Sensory, motivational and cognitive processes intact
"

Back 43

"food smell test

Natural preference to eat food that they had been exposed to in another rat.
Test immediate & test 24hrs: shows loss of memory, not loss of smell, smart enough.

SHOWS ANIMAL CAN DO THIS TASK."

Front 44

"setting up an animal model:

Severe anterograde amnesia or rapid forgetting

"

Back 44

"food smell test

Natural preference to eat food that they had been exposed to in another rat.
Test immediate & test 24hrs: shows loss of memory, not loss of smell, smart enough.

SHOWS ANTEROGRADE AMNESIA"

Front 45

"setting up an animal model:

deficit should be global in scope"

Back 45

"that is the impairment should span sensory and conceptual modalities of new learning.

Spatial – deficit on spatial place navigation

Nonspatial – deficit on nonspatial social transmission of food preference (previous slide).
"

Front 46

"setting up an animal model:

temporally graded retrograde amnesia"

Back 46

"food smell test

Training, lapse 30 days, surgery, test (does it like same food that it was exposed to?)
"

Front 47

"setting up an animal model:

Evidence of spared learning domains"

Back 47

"Cued navigation: Black platform shown. NO DEFICIT.
"

Front 48

declarative memory

Back 48

"hippocampus

facts and information"

Front 49

procedural memory

Back 49

"cerebellum/ striatum

habits or learning things across trials

mirror drawing - but doesn't have to be motor"

Front 50

emotional memory

Back 50

"amygdala

feel good & don't know why

As soon as you know why, it is declarative memory. High school's girlfriend perfurm in elevator"

Front 51

Role of the cerebral cortex

Back 51

ALL memories go through the cortex first, then to hippo, striatum, cerebellum, amydala, etc

Front 52

"radial-arm maze

win-shift"

Back 52

"working memory. Only go to arms hadn't been in yet.

Hippo damage (declarative memory)
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Front 53

"radial-arm maze

win-stay"

Back 53

" ‘habit’ of going toward the light.

striatum damage (procedual memory)
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Front 54

"radial-arm maze

CPP"

Back 54

"emotional attachment to a particular arm

Amydala damage
"

Front 55

A Triple Dissociation of Memory Systems

Back 55

mediates 3 different areas: hippo, amy, striatum

Front 56

estrogen's effect on working memory and reference memory

Back 56

"Estrogen enhances performance on WORKING MEMORY and impairs or has no effects on REFERENCE MEMORY.

Reference memory: radial arm maze.

Multiple memory systems.
"