How We Remember

Episodic memory proves essential for daily function, allowing us to remember where weparked the car, what time we walked the dog, or what a friend said earlier. In How We Remember,Michael Hasselmo draws on recent developments in neuroscience to present a new model describing thebrain mechanisms for encoding and remembering such episodes as spatiotemporal trajectories. Hereviews physiological breakthroughs on the regions implicated in episodic memory, including thediscovery of grid cells, the cellular mechanisms of persistent spiking and resonant frequency, andthe topographic coding of space and time. These discoveries inspire a theory for understanding theencoding and retrieval of episodic memory not just as discrete snapshots but as a dynamic replay ofspatiotemporal trajectories, allowing us to "retrace our steps" to recover a memory. Onthe behavioral level, Hasselmo emphasizes the capacity to encode and retrieve spatiotemporaltrajectories from personal experience, including the time and location of individual events. On thebiological level, he focuses on the dynamical properties of neurons and networks in the brainregions mediating episodic memory, addressing the role of neural oscillations and the effect ofdrugs on episodic memory. In the main text of the book, he presents the model in narrative form,accessible to scholars and advanced undergraduates in many fields. In the appendix, he presents thematerial in a more quantitative style, providing mathematical descriptions appropriate for advancedundergraduates and graduate students in neuroscience or engineering.

Michael Hasselmo is Professor of Psychology and Director of the Computational Neurophysiology Laboratory at Boston University, where he is also a faculty member in the Center for Memory and Brain and the Program in Neuroscience and principal investigator on grants from the National Institute of Mental Health and the Office of Naval Research