a-calcium/calmodulin-dependent protein kinase (aCaMKII) T286-autophosphorylation provides a short-term molecular memory that was thought to be required for LTP and for learning and memory. However, it has been shown that learning can occur in aCaMKII-T286A mutant mice after a massed training protocol. This raises the question of whether there…

In early childhood, humans learn culturally specific symbols for number that allow them entry into the world of complex numerical thinking. Yet little is known about how the brain supports the development of the uniquely human symbolic number system. Here, we use functional magnetic resonance imaging along with an effective connectivity analysis…

An important cellular mechanism contributing to the strength and duration of memories is activity-dependent alterations in the strength of synaptic connections within the neural circuit encoding the memory. Reversal of the memory is typically correlated with a reversal of the cellular changes to levels expressed prior to the stimulation. Thus, for…

It has been more than 50 years since the first description of ocular dominance plasticity--the profound modification of primary visual cortex (V1) following temporary monocular deprivation. This discovery immediately attracted the intense interest of neurobiologists focused on the general question of how experience and deprivation modify the brain…

Fear inhibition is markedly impaired in adolescent rodents and humans. The present experiments investigated whether this impairment is critically determined by the animal's age at the time of fear learning or their age at fear extinction. Male rats (n = 170) were tested for extinction retention after conditioning and extinction at different ages.…

The dorsal raphe nucleus (DRN) represents one of the most sensitive reward sites in the brain. However, the exact relationship between DRN neuronal activity and reward signaling has been elusive. In this review, we will summarize anatomical, pharmacological, optogenetics, and electrophysiological studies on the functions and circuit mechanisms of…

The capacity to tell the difference between two faces within an infrequently experienced face group (e.g. other species, other race) declines from 6 to 9 months of age unless infants learn to match these faces with individual-level names. Similarly, the use of individual-level labels can also facilitate differentiation of a group of non-face…

Studies investigating the development of memory processes and their neural substrates have flourished over the past two decades. The review by Jabès and Nelson (2015) adds an important piece to our understanding of the maturation of different elements and circuits within the hippocampal system and their association with the progressive development…

Social-cognitive and emotional factors as well as behavior problems contribute to the social difficulties experienced by many students with or at high risk for emotional and behavioral disorders (EBD). The way that teachers and peers treat and respond to these students can either mitigate or exacerbate their challenges in establishing and…

According to the standard model of systems consolidation (SMC), neocortical circuits are reactivated during the retrieval of declarative memories. This process initially requires the hippocampus. However, with the passage of time, neocortical circuits become strengthened and can eventually retrieve memory without input from the hippocampus.…

Extensive studies of "Drosophila" mushroom body in formation and retrieval of olfactory memories allow us to delineate the functional logic for memory storage and retrieval. Currently, there is a questionable disassociation of circuits for memory storage and retrieval during "Drosophila" olfactory memory processing. Formation…

The perineuronal net (PNN) surrounds neurons in the central nervous system and is thought to regulate developmental plasticity. A few studies have shown an involvement of the PNN in hippocampal plasticity and memory storage in adult animals. In addition to the hippocampus, plasticity in the medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) has been demonstrated to…

The prefrontal cortex (PFC) plays a critical role in cognitive functions, including working memory, attention regulation, behavioral inhibition, as well as memory storage. The functions of PFC are very sensitive to norepinephrine (NE), and even low levels of endogenously released NE exert a dramatic influence on the functioning of the PFC.…

There is increasing use of functional imaging data to understand the macro-connectome of the human brain. Of particular interest is the structure and function of intrinsic networks (regions exhibiting temporally coherent activity both at rest and while a task is being performed), which account for a significant portion of the variance in…

In this study, we investigated neural precursors of language acquisition as potential endophenotypes of autism spectrum disorder (ASD) in 3-month-old infants at high and low familial ASD risk. Infants were imaged using functional near-infrared spectroscopy while they listened to auditory stimuli containing syllable repetitions; their neural…