A molecular hypothesis on parallel memory function with relevance to senile dementias.
The hypothesis is presented that closely associated memories can be coded and decoded in a parallel manner analogous to genetic deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) forming two or more different proteins from a single polynucleotide strand. Iconic, aural, and lexical stimuli could be imprinted and recovered from the same storage molecule. The described process which involved the decoding of the same neuronal DNA macromolecule two or more times but from slightly shifted reading frames has the advantage of promoting fidelity of coding and decoding. The suggested mechanism also explains why it is possible for some mnemonic elements to survive during aphasia and senile dementias, while closely linked synonymous engrams are lost.
D001037:Aphasia / Q000235:genetics*; D003062:Codon; D004247:DNA / Q000235:genetics*; D003704:Dementia / Q000235:genetics*; D005815:Genetic Code; D006801:Humans; D008568:Memory; D009154:Mutation
D003062:Codon; D004247:DNA