The Neural Circuitry of Memory

• Richard F. Thompson: Memories are stored in localized neural circuits, i.e., "unique, reusable pathways in the brain along which signals flow"
  
  
• He proved this in the early 2000s with an experiment in which a rabbit's eyeblink response was conditioned to a sound. And, the place where the memory seems to have been stored is in the cerebellum, the "little brain" which is located at the back of our skull (see diagram on bottom right).
  
  
• Note that his discovery is about conditioned responses to events, that is, NOT about declarative memory for facts or experiences, but for learned reactions to events that happen to us that eventually become habitual or automatic.
  

• Eric Kandel: memories result from alterations in synaptic transmissions at specific sites, i.e. there are long-lasting changes in whether synapses fire or don't fire [= "Long-Term Potentiation"]

YouTube Video (2'43") explaining in greater detail what Kandel discovered in working with the sea snail.

• Neurogenesis: while we know that new neurons are not created in most of the brain after birth, recent research finds that some new neurons may develop in the dentate gyrus of the hippocampus (= neurogenesis). From research with Patient H.M., we know that the hippocampus is central to the storage of new memories.
  

Memory Organization: How is our long-term memory organized?