(9/9)
Why does this matter? Our findings reveal how the hippocampus coordinates multiple cognitive processes by aligning its subspaces, offering insights into naturalistic memory encoding and retrieval. This presents intriguing avenues for future research across various cognitive domains.

(8/9)
The canonical space, derived via PCA, reflects an intrinsic structure of the hippocampus and spatial gradients along the longitudinal axis. We found that PC 1 of the canonical space was associated with the memory formation subspace, while PC 3 was linked to novelty encoding subspaces.

(7/9)
Finally, we explored the relationship between the canonical space and functional subspaces of the hippocampus. what is a canonical space?

(6/9)
Memory formation and retrieval subspaces were also aligned, suggesting a shared mechanism. However, novelty encoding subspaces were not aligned with memory retrieval, indicating that while novelty processing interacts with memory formation, it does not significantly contribute to retrieval.

(5/9)
Our findings revealed that both novelty encoding subspaces aligned with the memory formation subspace. Participants with greater alignment between these subspaces had improved memory for the movie content. This suggests a hippocampal mechanism coordinating multiple memory processes.

(4/9)
What are low-dimensional subspaces? They represent weighted combinations of voxel responses or neuronal activities reflecting specific cognitive processes. In this study, we identified four subspaces: co-occurrence novelty , valence novelty encoding, memory formation, and memory retrieval.

(3/9)
Using fMRI, we recorded participants’ hippocampal activity while they watched a movie and verbally recalled its content. We analyzed the hippocampal dynamics and identified “low-dimensional subspaces” in the hippocampus for novelty encoding, memory formation, and retrieval.

(2/9)
The human brain processes multiple types of information simultaneously to form memories. For example, while watching a movie, we track which characters appear together (co-occurrence information) and how their relationships evolve (valence). But how does the hippocampus manage this complexity?

(1/9) Our recent study, published in Nature Communications, reveals the hippocampus’s role as a “coordinator” of memory processes during movie viewing and verbal recall.

Hi, I’m very pleased to share my social memory project with my PI Won Mok Shim and amazing collaborators @myoo.bsky.social

www.nature.com/articles/s41...

How does the hippocampus integrate multiple cognitive processes for memory encoding and retrieval?🧠

Here’s what we found⬇️: