Memory and brain - Neurobiological correlates of memory disturbances

A differentiation of memory is possible on the basis of chronological and contents-related aspects. Furthermore, it is possible to make process-specific subdivisions (encoding, transfer, consolidation, retrieval). The time-related division on the one hand refers to the general differentiation into short-term and long-term memory, and, on the other, to that between anterograde and retrograde memory ("new" and "old memory"; measured from a given time point, usually that when brain damage occurred). Anterograde memory means the successful encoding and storing of new information; retrograde the ability to retrieve successfully acquired and/or stored information. On the contents-based level, memory can be divided into five basic long-term systems-episodic memory, the knowledge system, perceptual, procedural and the priming form of memory. Neural correlates for these divisions are discussed with special emphasis of the episodic and the knowledge systems, based both on normal individuals and brain-damaged subjects. It is argued that structures of the limbic system are important for encoding of information and for its transfer into long-term memory. For this, two independent, but interacting memory circuits are proposed-one of them controlling and integrating primarily the emotional, and the other primarily the cognitive components of newly incoming information. For information storage principally neocortical structures are regarded as important and for the recall of information from the episodic and semantic memory systems the combined action of portions of prefrontal and anterior temporal regions is regarded as essential. Within this fronto-temporal agglomerate, a moderate hemispheric-specificity is assumed to exist with the right-hemispheric combination being mainly engaged in episodic memory retrieval and the left-hemispheric in that of semantic information. Evidence for this specialization comes from the results from focally brain-damaged patients as well as from that functional brain imaging in normal human subjects. Comparing results from imaging studies in memory disturbed patients with brain damage and from patients with a psychiatric diagnosis (e.g., psychogenic amnesia) revealed that both patient groups demonstrate comparable metabolic changes on the brain level. It can therefore be concluded that in neurological patients distinct, identifiable tissue damage is existent, while in psychiatric patients changes in the brain's biochemistry (release of stress hormones, and transmitters) constitute the physiological bases for the memory disturbances.