Browsing by Subject "oscillation"

Visual working memory (VWM) maintains information for future usage. Several studies show that the cortical oscillations in the γ-frequency band (from 30 to 120 Hz) are modulated by the VWM performance. However, less is known about the cortical sources underlying the modulation of these oscillations in VWM. To address this question, we recorded human neuronal activity with magneto- and electroencephalography (M/EEG) during a delayed-matching-to-sample VWM task with three different task conditions, within which participants were instructed to focus on different object features in turn. In addition, anatomical data was acquired with magnetic resonance imaging for source modeling purposes. We then estimated the cortical amplitude dynamics across frequencies from three to 90 Hz during the VWM retention period for these three different conditions. We found that the amplitudes of the γ –frequency band oscillations were strengthened in the occipito-temporal cortical areas during the VWM for shapes but not for color or spatial locations. These data suggest that γ –band oscillations are fundamental in VWM, especially for visual stimuli requiring perceptual feature binding. Furthermore, cortical γ –band oscillations were found to be load dependently strengthened in the frontal cortex, where the central executive and attention associated processes are believed to take place. These data support the previous hypotheses stating that γ –band oscillations contribute to the maintenance of object representations in VWM.