The role of NMDA receptors in memory and prediction in cultured neural networks

Martina Lamberti*, Michel J.A.M. van Putten, Sarah Marzen, Joost le Feber*

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Working paperPreprintAcademic

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Abstract

Memory has been extensively studied at the behavioural as well as the cellular level. Spike timing dependent plasticity (STDP) is associated with N-methyl-D-aspartate (NMDA) receptor activation and is widely accepted to be essential for long-term memory. However, experimental evidence remains sparse, probably due to the required complex combination of cellular and functional readouts. Recent work showed that in-vitro cortical networks memorize and predict inputs. The initial dependency of prediction on short-term memory decreased during the formation of long-term memory traces. Here, we stimulated in-vitro networks to investigate memory and prediction under control conditions, or under NMDA block. The NMDA anatagonist 2-amino-5-phosphonovaleric acid (APV) at a concentration that did not significantly reduce network excitability, but did impede long-term memory trace formation. In APV-treated cultures short-term memory of stimuli persisted, and they were still able to predict. In contrast to control cultures, prediction remained fully dependent on short-term memory. This confirms that NMDA receptor activation is essential for the formation of long-term memory traces and supports the notion that, as control cultures learn to memorize the stimulus, long-term memory starts to contribute to their predictive capability.
Original languageEnglish
PublisherbioRxiv
Number of pages22
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 1 Feb 2024

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