Cognitive and neural bases of episodic memory

情节记忆使我们能够有意识地回忆亲身经历的事件，通常包括围绕这些事件的空间、时间和感知背景的丰富细节。乙酰胆碱和多巴胺这两种神经递质似乎对这些能力特别重要。然而，关于它们作用的大部分证据来自用激动剂和拮抗剂短期操纵这些神经递质，以及观察这些系统恶化的患者(例如，在阿尔茨海默氏症和帕金森氏病中)。作为一个富有成效的替代方案，我们将使用健康个体大脑中乙酰胆碱和多巴胺水平的成熟外周指数，更仔细地研究被认为依赖于这两种神经递质中的一种或两种的记忆功能的几个不同方面。对于每个参与者，我们可以得出乙酰胆碱和多巴胺水平的单独指数，使我们能够确定其中一个或两者预测不同表现方面的程度。这种方法新颖、微创、廉价，将填补有关这些神经递质对人类记忆影响的行为学、神经成像和药理学文献之间的空白。

Episodic memory enables us to consciously recollect personally-experienced events, and often includes rich detail on the spatial, temporal, and perceptual context surrounding these events. Two neurotransmitters, acetylcholine and dopamine, appear to be particularly important for these abilities. Yet, the bulk of the evidence on their roles comes from short-term manipulation of these neurotransmitters with agonists and antagonists and from observing patients with deterioration of these systems (e.g., in Alzheimer's and Parkinson's diseases). As a fruitful alternative, we will use well-established peripheral indices of acetylcholine and dopamine levels in the brains of healthy individuals to look more closely at several different aspects of memory function thought to depend on one or both of these neurotransmitters. For each participant we can derive separate indices of acetylcholine and dopamine levels, enabling us to determine the degree to which one or both predict different aspects of performance. This approach is novel, minimally-invasive, inexpensive, and will fill in the gap among the behavioural, neuroimaging, and pharmacological literatures regarding these neurotransmitters' influence on human memory.