PT - JOURNAL ARTICLE AU - Lisman, JE AU - Idiart, MA TI - Storage of 7 +/- 2 short-term memories in oscillatory subcycles AID - 10.1126/science.7878473 DP - 1995 Mar 10 TA - Science PG - 1512--1515 VI - 267 IP - 5203 4099 - http://science.sciencemag.org/content/267/5203/1512.short 4100 - http://science.sciencemag.org/content/267/5203/1512.full SO - Science1995 Mar 10; 267 AB - Psychophysical measurements indicate that human subjects can store approximately seven short-term memories. Physiological studies suggest that short-term memories are stored by patterns of neuronal activity. Here it is shown that activity patterns associated with multiple memories can be stored in a single neural network that exhibits nested oscillations similar to those recorded from the brain. Each memory is stored in a different high-frequency ("40 hertz") subcycle of a low-frequency oscillation. Memory patterns repeat on each low-frequency (5 to 12 hertz) oscillation, a repetition that relies on activity-dependent changes in membrane excitability rather than reverberatory circuits. This work suggests that brain oscillations are a timing mechanism for controlling the serial processing of short-term memories.