Weber P B, Ojemann G A
Department of Neurological Surgery, University of Washington, Seattle 98195, USA.
Neuroreport. 1995 Mar 7;6(4):685-9. doi: 10.1097/00001756-199503000-00025.
The temporal lobe has a role in memory and learning. The objective of this study was to assess the activity of neurons in the temporal cortex of humans during learning. Single neuron activity was recorded with extracellular microelectrodes in adults undergoing awake craniotomies for resections for medically intractable epilepsy. Participants were administered control tasks of overt reading, silent reading, nonword visual controls and a recent verbal memory task with distracters followed by a verbal paired associates (PA) paradigm. Forty-nine neurons were identified and characterized by their relationship to language and memory. Neurons related to overt speech (Type A neurons) showed increased activity during learning in patients who were good learners compared to patients who were poor learners. Neurons not related to language or to memory (Type D neurons) showed increased activity with exposure to unlearned word pairs in poor learners compared with those who were good learners. Activity in all groups diminished with practice. Levels of activity in specific types of neurons in human temporal lobe differ in patients who learn word pairs rapidly or poorly.
颞叶在记忆和学习中发挥作用。本研究的目的是评估人类学习过程中颞叶皮质神经元的活动。在因药物难治性癫痫接受清醒开颅手术切除的成年人中，用细胞外微电极记录单个神经元的活动。参与者接受公开阅读、默读、非单词视觉对照等对照任务以及一项带有干扰项的近期言语记忆任务，随后是言语配对联想（PA）范式。通过与语言和记忆的关系识别并表征了49个神经元。与公开言语相关的神经元（A型神经元）在学习过程中，与学习能力差的患者相比，学习能力强的患者活动增加。与语言或记忆无关的神经元（D型神经元）在学习能力差的患者中，与学习能力强的患者相比，接触未学习的单词对时活动增加。所有组的活动随着练习而减少。在快速或缓慢学习单词对的患者中，人类颞叶特定类型神经元的活动水平有所不同。
