Gamma and beta bursts underlie working memory

By Mikael Lundqvist, Jonas Rose, Pawel Andrzej Herman, Scott L. Brincat, Timothy J. Buschman, Earl K. Miller. Neuron, 2016

751 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Summary Working memory is thought to result from sustained neuron spiking. However, computational models suggest complex dynamics with discrete oscillatory bursts. We analyzed local field potential (LFP) and spiking from the prefrontal cortex (PFC) of monkeys performing a working memory task. There were brief bursts of narrow-band gamma oscillations (45-100 Hz), varied in time and frequency, accompanying encoding and re-activation of sensory information. They appeared at a minority of recording sites associated with spiking reflecting the to-be-remembered items. Beta oscillations (20-35 Hz) also occurred in brief, variable bursts but reflected a default state interrupted by encoding and decoding. Only activity of neurons reflecting encoding/decoding correlated with changes in gamma burst rate. Thus, gamma bursts could gate access to, and prevent sensory interference with, working memory. This supports the hypothesis that working memory is manifested by discrete oscillatory dynamics and spiking, not sustained activity.

Subfields: Cognitive Neuroscience, Control and Systems Engineering

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/a7a9747830b7ae702c773083f5623d5a2728ff47

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In Cognitive Neuroscience

Citations in the corpus

Distributed theta networks support the control of working memory: Evidence from scalp and intracranial EEG (2025, unknown): “Beta bursts have also been linked to state transitions that interrupt default processing (Lundqvist et al., 2016), and impaired alpha-beta modulation during WM tasks has been observed in schizophrenia (Adams et al., 2020; Moran et al., 2018).”
Multiplexed Levels of Cognitive Control through Delta and Theta Neural Oscillations (2024, background): “Working memory studies, for example, indicate that there is an interplay between gamma and beta in pFC (Lundqvist et al., 2016, 2023), whereas alpha dynamics are typically observed during working memory maintenance in parietal and visual cortices (Sreenivasan & D ’ Esposito, 2019; van Ede, 2018;…”
Rhythms of human attention and memory: An embedded process perspective (2022, background): “In support, recurrent gamma oscillation bursts were found for (re)activated information in WM tasks in prefrontal networks (Lundqvist et al., 2016), and the parietal cortex of macaques, when this information was task relevant (Pesaran et al.”
Multimodal neuroimaging of hierarchical cognitive control. (2024, background): “This general pattern of anti-correlated dynamics which has been observed in numerous cognitive processes, including visual attention (Pagnotta et al., 2020; Pascucci et al., 2018) and working memory (Brincat et al., 2021; Lundqvist et al., 2016, 2018).”
Targeting neural oscillations with transcranial alternating current stimulation (2021, background): “However, trial-by-trial analysis reveals discrete burst events of rhythmic activity that only emerge as a band after trial averaging (Lundqvist, 2016; Shin, 2017).”
Alpha phase coding supports feature binding during working memory maintenance (2026, unknown): “Nonhu-man primate WM studies using invasive recordings in the monkeys ’ pre-frontal cortex, for example, have found an inverse relationship between gamma(~40 – 120 Hz)andbetapower(~20 – 35 Hz),mediatedbyoscillatory bursts 65 – 67 .”
Human Beta Oscillations Reflect Magnitude and Fidelity of Priority Shifts in Working Memory (2026, unknown): “Parallel work has emphasized the role of beta oscillations (15 – 30 Hz) in WM (Lundqvist et al., 2016; Spitzer and Haegens, 2017; Miller et al., 2018; Liljefors et al., 2024) but their role in prioritization is less clear, as priority switches likely require multiple subprocesses that could be…”
Linking the multiple-demand cognitive control system to human electrophysiological activity (2025, unknown): “As a more accessible proxy for population-level spiking rates, high-frequency gamma power and transient gamma bursts provide additional insights into this relationship (Carver et al., 2019; Lundqvist et al., 2018; Lundqvist et al., 2016; Pesaran et al., 2002).”
Distinct functions for beta and alpha bursts in gating of human working memory (2023, methodology): “We previously observed high power beta (14 – 35 Hz) bursts in prefrontal cortex of non-human primates as a single-trial correlate of executive WM control 8 – 12 .”
An oscillatory mechanism for multi-level storage in short-term memory (2021, unknown): “…work has proposed how oscillations can contribute to a variety of memory functions such as the generation or maintenance of persistent activity 15,16 ; the structuring of spatial codes through frequency coupling 17 ; and the coordination, control, and gating of memory-related activity 18 – 30 .”