Oxford Centre for Computational Neuroscience, Oxford, United Kingdom.
Department of Computer Science, University of Warwick, Coventry CV4 7AL, United Kingdom.
Cereb Cortex. 2024 Jan 14;34(1). doi: 10.1093/cercor/bhad416.
The frontal pole is implicated in humans in whether to exploit resources versus explore alternatives. Effective connectivity, functional connectivity, and tractography were measured between six human frontal pole regions and for comparison 13 dorsolateral and dorsal prefrontal cortex regions, and the 360 cortical regions in the Human Connectome Project Multi-modal-parcellation atlas in 171 HCP participants. The frontal pole regions have effective connectivity with Dorsolateral Prefrontal Cortex regions, the Dorsal Prefrontal Cortex, both implicated in working memory; and with the orbitofrontal and anterior cingulate cortex reward/non-reward system. There is also connectivity with temporal lobe, inferior parietal, and posterior cingulate regions. Given this new connectivity evidence, and evidence from activations and damage, it is proposed that the frontal pole cortex contains autoassociation attractor networks that are normally stable in a short-term memory state, and maintain stability in the other prefrontal networks during stable exploitation of goals and strategies. However, if an input from the orbitofrontal or anterior cingulate cortex that expected reward, non-reward, or punishment is received, this destabilizes the frontal pole and thereby other prefrontal networks to enable exploration of competing alternative goals and strategies. The frontal pole connectivity with reward systems may be key in exploit versus explore.
额极与人类是否利用资源还是探索替代方案有关。在 171 名 HCP 参与者中，我们测量了六个额极区域与 13 个背外侧和背侧前额叶皮层区域以及 360 个皮质区域之间的有效连通性、功能连通性和轨迹。额极区域与背外侧前额叶皮层区域、前额叶皮层区域具有有效连通性，这些区域都与工作记忆有关；与眶额和前扣带皮层的奖励/非奖励系统有关。额极区域还与颞叶、下顶叶和后扣带回区域有关。鉴于这种新的连通性证据以及激活和损伤的证据，有人提出额极皮层包含自动联想吸引器网络，这些网络在短期记忆状态下通常是稳定的，并且在稳定地利用目标和策略时保持其他前额叶网络的稳定性。然而，如果眶额或前扣带回皮层接收到预期奖励、非奖励或惩罚的输入，这会破坏额极的稳定性，从而破坏其他前额叶网络，以实现对竞争替代目标和策略的探索。额极与奖励系统的连接可能是利用与探索之间的关键。
