text: New Insights on How Memories Become Permanent
  by Madhumathi Palaniappan on January 2, 2017 at 5:52 PM Mental Health News
  A mechanism regulating rhythmic brain waves which play a key role in making our memories permanent was identified for the first time by a research team from the Institute of Science and Technology Austria (IST Austria).
  Memories undergo a consolidation process which stabilises and makes them become stronger -- a process where brain waves play an important role, the study said.
  The study revealed that one of the brain waves -- sharp wave ripples (SWRs) -- needed for consolidating memories is dominated by synaptic inhibition.
  'Brain waves called sharp wave ripples (SWRs) play a key role in memory making.'
  In the study, conducted in mice, the team set out to find the SWR mechanism -- whether ripples are caused by a temporal modulation of excitation or of inhibition at connecting points in brain cells, or synapses.
  "Inhibition ensures the precise timing of neuronal firing. This could be critically important for preplay or replay of neuronal activity sequences and the consolidation of memory.
  "Inhibition may be the crucial player to making memories permanent," explained Jian Gan, post-doctoral student at IST Austria, in the paper published in the journal Neuron.
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