Do PFC Memory neutrons form latches

[erickulcyk]

Hello,

I just learned from this paper, neuron activity related to short-term memory, that some neurons in the pre-frontal cortex fire rapidly in the cue phase of an experiment and not during the delay. Others fire during the delay and not during cue. Others fire during both.

I also read that these neurons are firing to "remember" what they learned. I'm curious as to how or why they have to keep firing to do this. I was wondering if the neurons that fire during the delay phase form a sort of two-neuron latch, where they the input comes from the neurons which fire during the cue phase, and during the delay phase the two neurons just continue activating each other to "remember" the pattern. Does this seem reasonable or is there another mechanism which causes the memory to exist?

Thanks,
Eric

[david23]

You are right about the constant activating each other part, but it's not just say 2 neurons it's constantly happening between multiple structures at both the micro and macro level