The Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, Vol 10, 167-177, Copyright © 1998 by The MIT Press

ARTICLES

Contribution of Human Prefrontal Cortex to Delay Performance

Linda L. Chao and Robert T. Knight

Neurological patients with focal lesions in the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex and age-matched control subjects were tested on an auditory version of the delayed-match-to-sample task employing environmental sounds. Subjects had to indicate whether a cue (S1) and a subsequent target sound (S2) were identical. On some trials, S1 and S2 were separated by a silent period of 5 sec. On other trials, the 5-sec delay between S1 and S2 was filled with irrelevant tone pips that served as distractors. Behaviorally, frontal patients were impaired by the presence of distractors. Electrophysiologically, patients generated enhanced primary auditory cortex-evoked responses to the tone pips, supporting a failure in inhibitory control of sensory processing after prefrontal damage. Intrahemispheric reductions of neural activity generated in the auditory association cortex and additional intrahemispheric reductions of attention-related frontal activity were also observed in the prefrontal patients. Together, these findings suggest that the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex is crucial for gating distracting information as well as maintaining distributed intrahemispheric neural activity during auditory working memory.

This article has been cited by other articles:

				A. B. Hains and A. F.T. Arnsten Molecular mechanisms of stress-induced prefrontal cortical impairment: Implications for mental illness Learn. Mem., August 6, 2008; 15(8): 551 - 564. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

				J. Rissman, A. Gazzaley, and M. D'Esposito Dynamic Adjustments in Prefrontal, Hippocampal, and Inferior Temporal Interactions with Increasing Visual Working Memory Load Cereb Cortex, July 1, 2008; 18(7): 1618 - 1629. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

				E. Feredoes, G. Tononi, and B. R. Postle The Neural Bases of the Short-Term Storage of Verbal Information Are Anatomically Variable across Individuals J. Neurosci., October 10, 2007; 27(41): 11003 - 11008. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

				H. Barbas and B. Zikopoulos The Prefrontal Cortex and Flexible Behavior Neuroscientist, October 1, 2007; 13(5): 532 - 545. [Abstract] [PDF]

				M Medalla, P Lera, M Feinberg, and H Barbas Specificity in Inhibitory Systems Associated with Prefrontal Pathways to Temporal Cortex in Primates Cereb Cortex, September 1, 2007; 17(suppl_1): i136 - i150. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

				E. J. Golob, R. Irimajiri, and A. Starr Auditory cortical activity in amnestic mild cognitive impairment: relationship to subtype and conversion to dementia Brain, March 1, 2007; 130(3): 740 - 752. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

				J. Fan, R. Kolster, J. Ghajar, M. Suh, R. T. Knight, R. Sarkar, and B. D. McCandliss Response Anticipation and Response Conflict: An Event-Related Potential and Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging Study J. Neurosci., February 28, 2007; 27(9): 2272 - 2282. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

				K. K. Sreenivasan and A. P. Jha Selective attention supports working memory maintenance by modulating perceptual processing of distractors. J. Cogn. Neurosci., January 1, 2007; 19(1): 32 - 41. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

				M. Germuska, S. Saha, J. Fiala, and H. Barbas Synaptic Distinction of Laminar-specific Prefrontal-temporal Pathways in Primates Cereb Cortex, June 1, 2006; 16(6): 865 - 875. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

				F. Dolcos and G. McCarthy Brain Systems Mediating Cognitive Interference by Emotional Distraction J. Neurosci., February 15, 2006; 26(7): 2072 - 2079. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

				B. R. Postle Delay-period Activity in the Prefrontal Cortex: One Function Is Sensory Gating J. Cogn. Neurosci., November 1, 2005; 17(11): 1679 - 1690. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

				J. S. Maxwell, A. J. Shackman, and R. J. Davidson Unattended Facial Expressions Asymmetrically Bias the Concurrent Processing of Nonemotional Information J. Cogn. Neurosci., September 1, 2005; 17(9): 1386 - 1395. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

				H. Barbas, M. Medalla, O. Alade, J. Suski, B. Zikopoulos, and P. Lera Relationship of Prefrontal Connections to Inhibitory Systems in Superior Temporal Areas in the Rhesus Monkey Cereb Cortex, September 1, 2005; 15(9): 1356 - 1370. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

				V. Menon, J. Leroux, C. D. White, and A. L. Reiss Frontostriatal deficits in fragile X syndrome: Relation to FMR1 gene expression PNAS, March 9, 2004; 101(10): 3615 - 3620. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

				N. G. Muller, L. Machado, and R. T. Knight Contributions of Subregions of the Prefrontal Cortex to Working Memory: Evidence from Brain Lesions in Humans J. Cogn. Neurosci., July 1, 2002; 14(5): 673 - 686. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

				R. A. Poldrack, E. Temple, A. Protopapas, S. Nagarajan, P. Tallal, M. Merzenich, and J. D. E. Gabrieli Relations Between the Neural Bases of Dynamic Auditory Processing and Phonological Processing: Evidence from fMRI J. Cogn. Neurosci., July 1, 2001; 13(5): 687 - 697. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

				E. F. Rabinowicz, G. Silipo, R. Goldman, and D. C. Javitt Auditory Sensory Dysfunction in Schizophrenia: Imprecision or Distractibility? Arch Gen Psychiatry, December 1, 2000; 57(12): 1149 - 1155. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

				S. Martinkauppi, P. Rama, H.J. Aronen, A. Korvenoja, and S. Carlson Working Memory of Auditory Localization Cereb Cortex, September 1, 2000; 10(9): 889 - 898. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]