Functional difference between rat perirhinal cortex and hippocampus in object and place discrimination tasks

The present study was designed to determine the degree of functional dissociation between the rat perirhinal cortex and hippocampus for reference memory performance on object and place discrimination tasks. In one experiment, 30 rats were trained on a two-pair concurrent object discrimination task in an elevated radial arm maze. Rats with a perirhinal cortex lesion needed significantly more days to attain the criterion in the relearning of a pre-operatively acquired object discrimination task than the control rats and rats with a hippocampal lesion. However, there were no significant differences between the three groups in the days to attain the criterion in learning post-operatively the original object discrimination task with new discriminanda and its relearning. The rats with a hippocampal lesion did not show any impairment in object discrimination. In a second experiment, 27 rats were trained on a place discrimination task in the same maze. Rats with a hippocampal lesion required more days to attain the criterion than the control rats to relearn the pre-operatively acquired place discrimination task, and they had fewer correct responses in the first three sessions with new discriminanda than the control rats. Rats with a perirhinal cortex lesion, on the other hand, showed mild relearning impairment. These results suggest that there is a functionally single dissociation between the perirhinal cortex and hippocampus for reference memory performance on object and place discrimination tasks. They also suggest the possible involvement of the perirhinal cortex in spatial reference memory performance.