Direction of oscillatory networks in the human medial temporal lobe reverses across verbal working memory phases

Theta- and gamma-band oscillatory interactions in the human medial temporal lobe reverse predominant direction across verbal Sternberg task phases, shifting posterior-to-anterior during encoding to anterior-to-posterior during retrieval.

• Why it matters: Directional coordination in the MTL is linked to memory processing, but its spatial organization across verbal working memory phases was unclear.
• What they did: Intracranial EEG and neuronal spiking were recorded from human MTL during a verbal Sternberg task, and theta/gamma directionality was analyzed across encoding, maintenance, and retrieval.
• The result: Theta reflecting working memory load was more prevalent in left than right MTL, with stronger spike-timing coordination from left theta; interhemispheric influence was predominantly left-to-right, with posterior-to-anterior enhanced in encoding and anterior-to-posterior enhanced in retrieval.

AI summary of the abstract · may contain errors · not medical advice · read the paper.