Our ability to recall memories of personal experiences is an essential part of daily life. These episodic memories often involve movement through space and thus require continuous encoding of one’s position relative to the surrounding environment. The medial temporal lobe (MTL) is thought to be critically involved, based on studies in freely moving rodents and stationary humans. However, it remains unclear if and how the MTL represents both space and memory especially during physical navigation, given challenges associated with deep brain recordings in humans during movement. We recorded intracranial electroencephalographic (iEEG) activity while participants completed an ambulatory spatial memory task within an immersive virtual reality environment. MTL theta activity was modulated by successful memory retrieval or spatial positions within the environment, depending on dynamically changing behavioral goals. Altogether, these results demonstrate how human MTL oscillations can represent both memory and space in a temporally flexible manner during freely moving navigation.

我们回忆个人经历的能力是日常生活的重要组成部分。这些情景记忆通常涉及空间移动，因此需要连续编码一个人相对于周围环境的位置。根据对自由移动的啮齿动物和静止的人类的研究，内侧颞叶（MTL）被认为至关重要。然而，考虑到人类运动过程中深部大脑记录所面临的挑战，目前还不清楚 MTL 是否以及如何代表空间和记忆，尤其是在物理导航过程中。当参与者在沉浸式虚拟现实环境中完成动态空间记忆任务时，我们记录了颅内脑电图（iEEG）活动。 MTL theta 活动是通过成功的记忆检索或环境中的空间位置来调节的，具体取决于动态变化的行为目标。总而言之，这些结果证明了人类 MTL 振荡如何在自由移动导航过程中以时间灵活的方式表示记忆和空间。