Dissociating the role of the parietal cortex and dorsal hippocampus for spatial information processing

Behav Neurosci. 2005 Oct;119(5):1307-15. doi: 10.1037/0735-7044.119.5.1307.

Abstract

Dorsal hippocampus, parietal cortex, and control lesioned rats were tested on both a metric and topological task. The metric task consisted of 2 different objects placed 68 cm apart on a cheese board. After habituation, the objects were moved to a separation of 38 cm on Day 1 and to a separation of 98 cm on Day 2. The topological task consisted of 4 different objects placed in a square orientation. After habituation, the first 2 objects were switched, and after the rats habituated to that change, the back 2 objects were switched. This was repeated on a different day with 4 new objects. The data suggest that the hippocampus is necessary for metric representations, whereas the parietal cortex is necessary for topological representations.

Publication types

  • Comparative Study
  • Research Support, N.I.H., Extramural
  • Research Support, U.S. Gov't, Non-P.H.S.

MeSH terms

  • Animals
  • Behavior, Animal
  • Exploratory Behavior / physiology
  • Habituation, Psychophysiologic / physiology
  • Hippocampus / injuries
  • Hippocampus / physiology*
  • Maze Learning / physiology
  • Parietal Lobe / injuries
  • Parietal Lobe / physiology*
  • Rats
  • Rats, Long-Evans
  • Space Perception / physiology*
  • Spatial Behavior / physiology*
  • Time Factors