There are high-res versions of important events. The locus coeruleus-noradrenaline system act in concerto with the amygdala to induce protein synthesis in the hippocampus to produce vivid episodic memories. It gets rewritten every time it's accessed, but it doesn't become abstracted away like the memory of mundane events.
Semantic memory is what we call our repertoire of facts and gists and otherwise abstract knowledge. You can lose your episodic memories while keeping your semantic memories and vice versa. Which is pretty cool.
Systems consolidation is the term for the hypothesized process where episodic memories are compressed and shipped out to the cerebral cortex for semantic storage.
You can use propranolol, a beta-blocker, to prevent noradrenaline from tagging a given episodic memory as "high priority" and you can sort of force it through the consolidation process this way. And yes, you can use it to treat PTSD.
Great information & a good summary, thank you! If I’m looking to get more in-depth with the known mechanisms of locus coeruleus and episodic memory, would you be able to recommend any sources of yours?
To try and tickle your interest, here’s why I’m looking into it: I have no episodic memory. I have aphantasia. I have hypotheses for explanations that I’m looking to correlate with different pieces of research, and locus coeruleus interactions is one area I have yet to look sufficiently deeply into.
There's a difference between low-res and high-res; that's what I'm getting at. I think it's interesting to know a little about how it might work.
There is something new and interesting about the topic to many people. And the paper itself represents a small blip of progress, though it must of course be hyped up to lure in eyeballs.
There are high-res versions of important events. The locus coeruleus-noradrenaline system act in concerto with the amygdala to induce protein synthesis in the hippocampus to produce vivid episodic memories. It gets rewritten every time it's accessed, but it doesn't become abstracted away like the memory of mundane events.
Semantic memory is what we call our repertoire of facts and gists and otherwise abstract knowledge. You can lose your episodic memories while keeping your semantic memories and vice versa. Which is pretty cool.
Systems consolidation is the term for the hypothesized process where episodic memories are compressed and shipped out to the cerebral cortex for semantic storage.
You can use propranolol, a beta-blocker, to prevent noradrenaline from tagging a given episodic memory as "high priority" and you can sort of force it through the consolidation process this way. And yes, you can use it to treat PTSD.