Brain-wide Mapping Reveals That Engrams for a Single Memory Are Distributed Across Multiple Brain Regions

Overview

Journal Nat Commun

Specialty Biology

Date 2022 Apr 5

PMID 35379803

Authors

Dheeraj S Roy

Young-Gyun Park

Minyoung E Kim

Ying Zhang

Sachie K Ogawa

Nicholas DiNapoli

Xinyi Gu

Jae H Cho

Heejin Choi

Lee Kamentsky

Jared Martin

Olivia Mosto

Tomomi Aida

Kwanghun Chung

Susumu Tonegawa

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

Neuronal ensembles that hold specific memory (memory engrams) have been identified in the hippocampus, amygdala, or cortex. However, it has been hypothesized that engrams of a specific memory are distributed among multiple brain regions that are functionally connected, referred to as a unified engram complex. Here, we report a partial map of the engram complex for contextual fear conditioning memory by characterizing encoding activated neuronal ensembles in 247 regions using tissue phenotyping in mice. The mapping was aided by an engram index, which identified 117 cFos brain regions holding engrams with high probability, and brain-wide reactivation of these neuronal ensembles by recall. Optogenetic manipulation experiments revealed engram ensembles, many of which were functionally connected to hippocampal or amygdala engrams. Simultaneous chemogenetic reactivation of multiple engram ensembles conferred a greater level of memory recall than reactivation of a single engram ensemble, reflecting the natural memory recall process. Overall, our study supports the unified engram complex hypothesis for memory storage.

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