Neves Guilherme, Cooke Sam F, Bliss Tim V P
Division of Neurophysiology, Medical Research Council National Institute for Medical Research, Mill Hill, London, NW7 1AA, UK.
Nat Rev Neurosci. 2008 Jan;9(1):65-75. doi: 10.1038/nrn2303.
Two facts about the hippocampus have been common currency among neuroscientists for several decades. First, lesions of the hippocampus in humans prevent the acquisition of new episodic memories; second, activity-dependent synaptic plasticity is a prominent feature of hippocampal synapses. Given this background, the hypothesis that hippocampus-dependent memory is mediated, at least in part, by hippocampal synaptic plasticity has seemed as cogent in theory as it has been difficult to prove in practice. Here we argue that the recent development of transgenic molecular devices will encourage a shift from mechanistic investigations of synaptic plasticity in single neurons towards an analysis of how networks of neurons encode and represent memory, and we suggest ways in which this might be achieved. In the process, the hypothesis that synaptic plasticity is necessary and sufficient for information storage in the brain may finally be validated.
几十年来，关于海马体的两个事实在神经科学家当中已是共识。其一，人类海马体受损会妨碍新情景记忆的形成；其二，依赖活动的突触可塑性是海马体突触的一个显著特征。基于这样的背景，海马体依赖性记忆至少部分是由海马体突触可塑性介导的这一假说，在理论上看似很有说服力，但在实践中却难以证明。在此我们认为，转基因分子装置的最新进展将促使研究从对单个神经元突触可塑性的机制性研究，转向分析神经元网络如何编码和表征记忆，并且我们提出了实现这一转变的方法。在此过程中，突触可塑性对于大脑中信息存储既必要又充分这一假说或许最终能够得到验证。
