By Susan Young, Technology Review
Scientists have created a false memory in mice by manipulating neurons that bear the memory of a place. The work further demonstrates just how unreliable memory can be. It also lays new ground for understanding the cell behavior and circuitry that controls memory, and could one day help researchers discover new ways to treat mental illnesses influenced by memory. In the study, published in Science on Thursday, the MIT scientists show that they can modify a memory and have a mouse believe it experienced something it didn’t. Susumu Tonegawa, a neuroscientist at MIT, and members of his lab used mice that were genetically modified to allow for certain neurons to be activated with a flash of light; the technique enabled the researchers to activate a memory that caused a mouse to believe it had experienced electrical shocks in a particular box, even though no such thing had happened there. “The process of memory is nothing like a tape recording,” says study co-first author Steve Ramirez. “It’s really malleable and susceptible to the incorporation of new information.”
http://www.technologyreview.com/news/517226/scientists-make-mice-remember-things-that-didnt-happen/
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