Dartmouth Events

Psychological and Brain Sciences Colloquium

Wolford Lecturer, David Glanzman, PhD, University of California, Los Angeles

Friday, April 13, 2018
4:00pm – 5:00pm
Moore BO3
Intended Audience(s): Public
Categories: Lectures & Seminars

Please join us in Moore BO3 on Friday, April 13, 2018, at 4 p.m., as Wolford Lecturer, David Glanzman, Professor, Departments of Integrative Biology and Physiology and Neurobiology and Co-Director, Integrative Center for Learning and Memory Brain Research Institute at UCLA, presents "The Mechanisms of Occult Long-term Memory in Aplysia."

Abstract:  The biological basis of the engram, the physical memory trace, remains opaque.  It is widely believed that long-term memories are stored as changes in the strengths of synaptic connections in the brain.  This neurobiological model for the engram, the synaptic plasticity model, has extensive experimental support.  Nonetheless, recent evidence from my laboratory and those of other investigators has challenged the synaptic plasticity model.  In particular, it has been shown that long-term memory can persist, at least partially, in the absence of synaptic change.  This “occult” component of memory, which appears to reside in the cell bodies of neurons, permits the full induction of a memory following its disruption by antimnemonic manipulations such as reconsolidation blockade and post-training inhibition of protein synthesis.  Here, I will describe how long-term memory can persist occultly in the marine snail Aplysia, and present evidence that occult memory is mediated by epigenetic changes.  Memory-related epigenetic changes, in turn, may be induced by RNA. 

A reception will follow outside of Moore 202.

For more information, contact:
Michelle Powers

Events are free and open to the public unless otherwise noted.