Long-term learning transforms prefrontal cortex representations during working memory

doi:10.1016/j.neuron.2022.09.019

Long-term learning transforms prefrontal cortex representations during working memory

2022-11-01

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DOI：10.1016/j.neuron.2022.09.019

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The role of the lateral prefrontal cortex (lPFC) in working memory (WM) is debated. Non-human primate (NHP) electrophysiology shows that the lPFC stores WM representations, but human neuroimaging suggests that the lPFC controls WM content in sensory cortices. These accounts are confounded by differences in task training and stimulus exposure. We tested whether long-term training alters lPFC function by densely sam-pling WM activity using functional MRI. Over 3 months, participants trained on both a WM and serial reaction time (SRT) task, wherein fractal stimuli were embedded within sequences. WM performance improved for trained (but not novel) fractals and, neurally, delay activity increased in distributed lPFC voxels across learning. Item-level WM representations became detectable within lPFC patterns, and lPFC activity reflected sequence relationships from the SRT task. These findings demonstrate that human lPFC develops stimulus -selective responses with learning, and WM representations are shaped by long-term experience, which could reconcile competing accounts of WM functioning.

Keywords:

SURFACE-BASED ANALYSIS

MNEMONIC REPRESENTATIONS

SUSTAINED ACTIVITY

MIXED SELECTIVITY

COGNITIVE CONTROL

FRONTAL-CORTEX

PARIETAL

INFORMATION

NEURONS

MODEL

Long-term learning transforms prefrontal cortex representations during working memory

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