Gamma brain waves related to memory

[Bernard]

Breaking research from the University of Pennsylvania answers one of the questions I had about the 5th brain wave spectrum:

... The study, the first to show that brain waves predict the veracity of human memories, is pubished in the journal Psychological Science.
...
While patients performed the memory game, scientists observed electrical activity in their brains to determine whether specific brain waves were associated with successfully storing and retrieving memories. Researchers found that a fast brain wave, known as the gamma rhythm, increased when participants studied a word that they would later recall. The same gamma waves, whose voltage rises and fall between 50 and 100 times per second, also increased in the half-second prior to participants correctly recalling an item.

These analyses revealed that the same pattern of gamma band oscillatory activity in the hippocampus, prefrontal cortex and left temporal lobe that predicts successful memory formation also re-emerged at retrieval, distinguishing correct from incorrect responses, said Per B. Sederberg, lead author and former Penn neuroscientist now performing post-doctoral research at Princeton University. The timing of these oscillatory effects suggests that self-cued memory retrieval initiates in the hippocampus and then spreads to the cortex. Thus, retrieval of true as compared with false memories induces a distinct pattern of gamma oscillations, possibly reflecting recollection of contextual information associated with past experience.

Gamma waves actually predicted whether or not an item that was about to be recalled was previously studied, said Michael Kahana, a professor of psychology in Penns School of Arts and Sciences and lead investigator. In other words, one could see a difference in brain activity just prior to remembering something that had and had not actually happened. ...

Brain Waves That Distinguish False Memories From Real Ones Pinpointed

Full article is available to APS members here

Everything I learned in conjunction with my research on EEG neurofeedback mentioned that the gamma wave spectrum existed, but it's function wasn't ever explained (or considered as far as the neurofeedback training protocols).