University of Missouri, Columbia, MO 65211, USA.
J Cogn Neurosci. 2011 Oct;23(10):2852-63. doi: 10.1162/jocn.2011.21625. Epub 2011 Jan 24.
Over 350 years ago, Descartes proposed that the neural basis of consciousness must be a brain region in which sensory inputs are combined. Using fMRI, we identified at least one such area for working memory, the limited information held in mind, described by William James as the trailing edge of consciousness. Specifically, a region in the left intraparietal sulcus was found to demonstrate load-dependent activity for either visual stimuli (colored squares) or a combination of visual and auditory stimuli (spoken letters). This result was replicated across two experiments with different participants and methods. The results suggest that this brain region, previously well known for working memory of visually presented materials, actually holds or refers to information from more than one modality.
350 多年前，笛卡尔提出意识的神经基础必须是一个将感觉输入组合在一起的大脑区域。使用 fMRI，我们确定了至少一个用于工作记忆的这样的区域，工作记忆是指被威廉·詹姆斯描述为意识的“边缘”的在头脑中保持的有限信息。具体来说，在左顶内沟的一个区域中发现了与视觉刺激（彩色方块）或视觉和听觉刺激的组合（口语字母）的负载相关的活动。这一结果在两个具有不同参与者和方法的实验中得到了复制。结果表明，这个先前因视觉呈现材料的工作记忆而广为人知的大脑区域，实际上包含或指向来自多种模式的信息。
