Do you get back on your bike after a decade and find it easy to keep your balance, yet you can’t remember the names of your friends from kindergarten? Scientists know why this happens.
This may be because physical skills called motor memories are encoded differently in our brains than our memories of names and facts. Scientists from the Wu Cai Institute of Neurology at Stanford University decided to take a closer look at it.
How is motor memory formed?
The study shows how motor memories are formed and why they are so persistent. It may even help explain the causes of movement disorders such as Parkinson’s disease. “We believe that motor memory is unique,” said Jun Ding, professor of neurosurgery and neurology. - Some Alzheimer’s studies have involved participants who were previously musicians and had no memory of their families, but were still able to play beautiful music. He explains that there is a huge difference in how motor memories are formed.
Memories are thought to be encoded in the brain as the activity of a network of hundreds or thousands of neurons, sometimes located in distant regions of the brain. The concept of such a memory trace, sometimes called a memory engram, has been around for over a century, but pinpointing exactly what an engram is and how it is encoded has proven to be an extremely difficult task. Previous research has shown that certain forms of learning activate certain neurons that are reactivated when learned memories are recalled. However, it is unknown if memory engram neurons exist for learning motor skills.
Are motor memories scattered?
Dean and his team wanted to find out how these engram-like groups of cells are involved in learning and remembering a new motor skill. - When you first learn to throw a basketball or something new, you use a completely different set of neurons each time, but as you get better, you use a more complex set that is the same every time. These improved neural pathways were thought to form the basis of the memory engram, but we wanted to know exactly how these pathways came about, the researchers explain.
The results of their study were published in the journal Neuron. For their experiment, they taught mice to use their paws to reach food pellets through a small gap. The scientists labeled potential engram cells with a fluorescent marker to see if they play a role in memory and what role they play. The researchers were looking for answers to the question of how these particular groups of neurons take on the responsibility of learning a new task.
Scientists have noticed that so-called “engram neurons” reprogram themselves after mice have learned a certain activity. Engram cells in the motor cortex pick up new synaptic signals that potentially reflect information about movement, and themselves create powerful new outgoing connections in a distant region of the brain called the dorsolateral striatum, a key pathway by which engram neurons can perform improved exercise. animal movement control. This is the first time such a thing has been observed.
The findings suggest that motor memories are dispersed. Scientists say that by repeating learned skills, we are constantly strengthening motor engrams, building new connections - improving skills. This is what the term “muscle memory” means, a complex network of motor engrams used so often that the skills associated with it seem automatic.
Hope for Parkinson’s patients?
It is currently believed that Parkinson’s disease is the result of blocking these motor engrams, but what if they are really lost and people forget about these skills? Dean said. “Even walking is a motor skill that we all learned at some point and could potentially be forgotten,” he added.
Solving the puzzle may be the key to developing effective treatments for movement disorders. If Parkinson’s disease is the result of motor memory blockage, patients should be able to improve their motor skills by exercising and strengthening those motor skills. On the other hand, if Parkinson’s disease destroys motor engrams and inhibits the creation of new ones, then a completely different approach must be taken for effective treatment.
Scientists have already announced further studies on movement disorders in Parkinson’s disease.
Source: Wprost
