title: Role of the hippocampus in goal-oriented tasks requiring retrieval of spatial versus non-spatial information.
abstract: The role of the hippocampus in non-spatial memory has been issue of some controversy. To investigate the nature of dorsal hippocampus engagement in spatial and non-spatial memory we performed discrete excitotoxic lesions of this region before mice (C57/BL6) were trained in one of two tasks that required the animals to retrieve a hidden food reward. In the visuospatial task animals had to remember a particular spatial location, independent of odor cues. In contrast, in a non-spatial olfactory task animals had to remember a particular odor, independent of spatial location. The mice were trained in one of these tasks over a period of three days. We found that lesions restricted to the dorsal hippocampus affected performance only in the spatial task. In contrast, lesions that also encompassed a larger portion of the ventral hippocampus caused a moderate deficit in the olfactory task. These results are consistent with the role of the dorsal hippocampus in long-term spatial episodic memory, and support the involvement of larger portions of the hippocampus on the encoding of non-spatial olfactory representations.
authors.affiliation: Department of Neuroscience, Columbia University, College of Physicians and Surgeons, Howard Hughes Medical Institute, 1051 Riverside Drive, New York, NY 10032, USA.
authors.forename: Liat
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Levita
authors.forename: Isabel A
authors.initials: IA
authors.lastname: Muzzio
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D003463:Cues; D056344:Executive Function / Q000502:physiology*; D006040:Goals; D006624:Hippocampus / Q000187:drug effects / Q000293:injuries / Q000502:physiology*; D008297:Male; D011939:Mental Recall / Q000502:physiology*; D051379:Mice; D008810:Mice, Inbred C57BL; D016202:N-Methylaspartate / Q000633:toxicity; D009483:Neuropsychological Tests; D009498:Neurotoxins / Q000633:toxicity; D055696:Olfactory Perception / Q000502:physiology; D012201:Reward; D013028:Space Perception / Q000502:physiology*; D014796:Visual Perception / Q000502:physiology*
chemical_list: D009498:Neurotoxins; D016202:N-Methylaspartate