The role of rat dorsomedial prefrontal cortex in working memory for egocentric responses

The present experiment studied the effects of quinolinic acid (90 mM) lesio ns of the medial precentral and anterior cingulate on working memory for eg ocentric responses. Rats were trained on a delayed match-to-sample task tha t involved memory for a 90 degrees right or left turn. The results indicate d that lesioned rats had significantly decreased scores during the 10 s del ay condition compared to presurgery levels. An increase in the delay to 20 s significantly reduced working memory performance in the lesioned rats com pared to that of controls. These findings suggest that the rat medial prece ntral and/or anterior cingulate area play an important role in working memo ry for egocentric responses. (C) 2001 Published by Elsevier Science Ireland Ltd.