Direct electrical stimulation of the human brain can elicit sensory and motor perceptions as well as recall of memories. Stimulating higher order association areas of the lateral temporal cortex in particular was reported to activate visual and auditory memory representations of past experiences (Penfield and Perot, 1963). We hypothesized that this effect could be used to modulate memory processing. Recent attempts at memory enhancement in the human brain have been focused on the hippocampus and other mesial temporal lobe structures, with a few reports of memory improvement in small studies of individual brain regions. Here, we investigated the effect of stimulation in four brain regions known to support declarative memory: hippocampus, parahippocampal neocortex, prefrontal cortex and temporal cortex. Intracranial electrode recordings with stimulation were used to assess verbal memory performance in a group of 22 patients (nine males). We show enhanced performance with electrical stimulation in the lateral temporal cortex (paired t-test, P = 0.0067), but not in the other brain regions tested. This selective enhancement was observed both on the group level, and for two of the four individual subjects stimulated in the temporal cortex. This study shows that electrical stimulation in specific brain areas can enhance verbal memory performance in humans.

中文翻译：

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外侧颞叶皮质电刺激刺激语言记忆的证据

人脑的直接电刺激可以引起感觉和运动知觉以及记忆的回忆。据报道，特别是通过刺激外侧颞叶皮质的高阶关联区域，可以激活过去经历的视觉和听觉记忆表征（Penfield和Perot，1963年）。我们假设此效应可用于调节内存处理。在人类大脑中增强记忆力的最新尝试已集中在海马和其他颞叶内侧颞叶结构上，在个别大脑区域的小型研究中有一些关于改善记忆力的报道。在这里，我们调查了已知支持声明性记忆的四个大脑区域的刺激作用：海马，海马旁新皮层，前额叶皮层和颞叶皮层。颅内电极刺激记录被用来评估22名患者（9名男性）的言语记忆能力。我们显示了在颞外侧皮层中电刺激的增强性能（成对t检验，P = 0.0067），但未在其他大脑区域进行检验。这种选择性增强在小组水平上以及在颞皮层刺激的四个个体受试者中的两个中都可以观察到。这项研究表明，特定大脑区域的电刺激可以增强人类的言语记忆能力。