The DOI matches its Crossref record; 48 of the 49 references it cites were found in a registry or an index.
The Hippocampus and Entorhinal Cortex Encode the Path and Euclidean Distances to Goals during Navigation
Open accessAbstract
BACKGROUND: Despite decades of research on spatial memory, we know surprisingly little about how the brain guides navigation to goals. While some models argue that vectors are represented for navigational guidance, other models postulate that the future path is computed. Although the hippocampal formation has been implicated in processing spatial goal information, it remains unclear whether this region processes path- or vector-related information. RESULTS: We report neuroimaging data collected from subjects navigating London's Soho district; these data reveal that both the path distance and the Euclidean distance to the goal are encoded by the medial temporal lobe during navigation. While activity in the posterior hippocampus was sensitive to the distance along the path, activity in the entorhinal cortex was correlated with the Euclidean distance component of a vector to the goal. During travel periods, posterior hippocampal activity increased as the path to the goal became longer, but at decision points, activity in this region increased as the path to the goal became closer and more direct. Importantly, sensitivity to the distance was abolished in these brain areas when travel was guided by external cues. CONCLUSIONS: The results indicate that the hippocampal formation contains representations of both the Euclidean distance and the path distance to goals during navigation. These findings argue that the hippocampal formation houses a flexible guidance system that changes how it represents distance to the goal depending on the fluctuating demands of navigation.
Overview
The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.
Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.
Integrity signals
Registry
Cites
Statistics
Verification
Claims the paper makes
The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.
Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.
Claims other papers make about this one
Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?
In the citing paper
“The hippocampus mask was a combination of right mid and posterior sections (a priori based on the results of Howard et al. 2014).”
From Hippocampal and Retrosplenial Goal Distance Coding After Long-term Consolidation of a Real-World Environment (2019) · cites this paper as Howard et al. 2014
In the citing paper
“such distance tracking is not automatic and requires goal-directed navigation.”
From Hippocampal and Retrosplenial Goal Distance Coding After Long-term Consolidation of a Real-World Environment (2019) · cites this paper as Howard et al. 2014
In the citing paper
“However, while Howard et al. (2014) found a positive correlation between posterior right hippocampal activity and distance, we observed a negative correlation in the recently learned environments.”
From Hippocampal and Retrosplenial Goal Distance Coding After Long-term Consolidation of a Real-World Environment (2019) · cites this paper as Howard et al. 2014
In the citing paper
“The observation that this was specific to navigation routes and not present in control routes is consistent with prior evidence (Howard et al. 2014) that such distance tracking is not automatic and requires goal-directed navigation.”
From Hippocampal and Retrosplenial Goal Distance Coding After Long-term Consolidation of a Real-World Environment (2019) · cites this paper as Howard et al. 2014
In the citing paper
“The correlation of hippocampal activity to distance to goal during travel periods in navigation routes in the recently learned environment agrees with prior fMRI reports of similar coding (Viard et al. 2011; Sherrill et al. 2013; Howard et al. 2014; Balaguer et al. 2016) and supports models which argue the hippocampus computes information about the future path to goal for navigational guidance (Er”
From Hippocampal and Retrosplenial Goal Distance Coding After Long-term Consolidation of a Real-World Environment (2019) · cites this paper as Howard et al. 2014
Self-check
Percentages, sums and reported differences re-computed from the paper’s own numbers.
The self-check needs the paper’s full text.
Citations
Cites
(1978) · UA Campus Repository (The University of Arizona) · Cited by 8,010
The hippocampus as a cognitive map
Passingham, R. E. (1979) · Neuroscience · doi:10.1016/0306-4522(79)90015-0 · Cited by 5,128
Microstructure of a spatial map in the entorhinal cortex
Hafting, T., Fyhn, M., Molden, S., Moser, M.-B., & Moser, E. I. (2005) · Nature · doi:10.1038/nature03721 · Cited by 4,068
Taube, J., Muller, R., & Ranck, J. (1990) · The Journal of Neuroscience · doi:10.1523/jneurosci.10-02-00420.1990 · Cited by 1,809
Andersen, R. A., Snyder, L. H., Bradley, D. C., & Xing, J. (1997) · Annual Review of Neuroscience · doi:10.1146/annurev.neuro.20.1.303 · Cited by 1,486
Two cortical systems for memory-guided behaviour
Ranganath, C., & Ritchey, M. (2012) · Nature Reviews Neuroscience · doi:10.1038/nrn3338 · Cited by 1,377
Knowing Where and Getting There: A Human Navigation Network
Maguire, E. A., Burgess, N., Donnett, J. G., Frackowiak, R. S. J., Frith, C. D., & O'Keefe, J. (1998) · Science · doi:10.1126/science.280.5365.921 · Cited by 1,303
Hippocampal place-cell sequences depict future paths to remembered goals
Pfeiffer, B. E., & Foster, D. J. (2013) · Nature · doi:10.1038/nature12112 · Cited by 1,216
Long-axis specialization of the human hippocampus
Poppenk, J., Evensmoen, H. R., Moscovitch, M., & Nadel, L. (2013) · Trends in Cognitive Sciences · doi:10.1016/j.tics.2013.03.005 · Cited by 1,100
Neural ensembles in CA3 transiently encode paths forward of the animal at a decision point
Johnson, A., & Redish, A. D. (2007) · The Journal of Neuroscience · doi:10.1523/jneurosci.3761-07.2007 · Cited by 1,003
Optimal decision making and the anterior cingulate cortex
Kennerley, S. W., Walton, M. E., Behrens, T. E. J., Buckley, M. J., & Rushworth, M. F. S. (2006) · Nature Neuroscience · doi:10.1038/nn1724 · Cited by 948
Comparison of spatial firing characteristics of units in dorsal and ventral hippocampus of the rat
Jung, M. W., Wiener, S. I., & McNaughton, B. L. (1994) · Journal of Neuroscience · doi:10.1523/jneurosci.14-12-07347.1994 · Cited by 844
The Well-Worn Route and the Path Less Traveled
Hartley, T., Maguire, E. A., Spiers, H. J., & Burgess, N. (2003) · Neuron · doi:10.1016/s0896-6273(03)00095-3 · Cited by 817
Self-citationThe reorganization and reactivation of hippocampal maps predict spatial memory performance
Dupret, D., O'Neill, J., Pleydell-Bouverie, B., & Csicsvari, J. (2010) · Nature Neuroscience · doi:10.1038/nn.2599 · Cited by 769
Anterior Cingulate: Single Neuronal Signals Related to Degree of Reward Expectancy
Shidara, M., & Richmond, B. J. (2002) · Science · doi:10.1126/science.1069504 · Cited by 515
The hippocampus as a cognitive graph.
Muller, R. U., Stead, M., & Pach, J. (1996) · The Journal of general physiology · doi:10.1085/jgp.107.6.663 · Cited by 391
Thoughts, behaviour, and brain dynamics during navigation in the real world
Spiers, H. J., & Maguire, E. A. (2006) · NeuroImage · doi:10.1016/j.neuroimage.2006.01.037 · Cited by 371
Self-citationAggleton, J. P. (2011) · Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Reviews · doi:10.1016/j.neubiorev.2011.09.005 · Cited by 339
Navigation around London by a taxi driver with bilateral hippocampal lesions
Maguire, E. A., Nannery, R., & Spiers, H. J. (2006) · Brain · doi:10.1093/brain/awl286 · Cited by 335
Self-citationWolbers, T., Wiener, J. M., Mallot, H. A., & Büchel, C. (2007) · Journal of Neuroscience · doi:10.1523/jneurosci.2146-07.2007 · Cited by 290
Duncan, K. D., Ketz, N., Inati, S., & Davachi, L. (2011) · Hippocampus · doi:10.1002/hipo.20933 · Cited by 284
Iaria, G., Chen, J., Guariglia, C., Ptito, A., & Petrides, M. (2007) · European Journal of Neuroscience · doi:10.1111/j.1460-9568.2007.05371.x · Cited by 274
Match–Mismatch Processes Underlie Human Hippocampal Responses to Associative Novelty
Kumaran, D., & Maguire, E. A. (2007) · Journal of Neuroscience · doi:10.1523/jneurosci.1677-07.2007 · Cited by 264
Rosenbaum, R. S., Ziegler, M., Winocur, G., Grady, C. L., & Moscovitch, M. (2004) · Hippocampus · doi:10.1002/hipo.10218 · Cited by 258
Distance estimation from cognitive maps
Thorndyke, P. W. (1981) · Cognitive Psychology · doi:10.1016/0010-0285(81)90019-0 · Cited by 256
Interaction between the Human Hippocampus and the Caudate Nucleus during Route Recognition
Voermans, N. C., Petersson, K. M., Daudey, L., Weber, B., van Spaendonck, K. P. M., Kremer, H. P. H., & Fernández, G. (2004) · Neuron · doi:10.1016/j.neuron.2004.07.009 · Cited by 247
A navigational guidance system in the human brain
Spiers, H. J., & Maguire, E. A. (2007) · Hippocampus · doi:10.1002/hipo.20298 · Cited by 236
Self-citationDistances between real-world locations are represented in the human hippocampus
Morgan, L. K., MacEvoy, S. P., Aguirre, G. K., & Epstein, R. A. (2011) · The Journal of Neuroscience · doi:10.1523/jneurosci.4667-10.2011 · Cited by 203
Hippocampus and retrosplenial cortex combine path integration signals for successful navigation
Sherrill, K. R., Erdem, U. M., Ross, R. S., Brown, T. I., Hasselmo, M. E., & Stern, C. E. (2013) · The Journal of Neuroscience · doi:10.1523/jneurosci.1825-13.2013 · Cited by 167
Anterior hippocampus and goal-directed spatial decision making
Viard, A., Doeller, C. F., Hartley, T., Bird, C. M., & Burgess, N. (2011) · The Journal of Neuroscience · doi:10.1523/jneurosci.4640-10.2011 · Cited by 144
Brown, T. I., Ross, R. S., Keller, J. B., Hasselmo, M. E., & Stern, C. E. (2010) · Journal of Neuroscience · doi:10.1523/jneurosci.6021-09.2010 · Cited by 130
A biologically inspired hierarchical goal directed navigation model
Erdem, U. M., & Hasselmo, M. E. (2013) · Journal of Physiology-Paris · doi:10.1016/j.jphysparis.2013.07.002 · Cited by 107
Howard, L. R., Kumaran, D., Ólafsdóttir, H. F., & Spiers, H. J. (2011) · Journal of Neuroscience · doi:10.1523/jneurosci.6055-10.2011 · Cited by 102
Self-citationHirshhorn, M., Grady, C., Rosenbaum, R. S., Winocur, G., & Moscovitch, M. (2012) · Neuropsychologia · doi:10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2012.08.008 · Cited by 85
Linear Look-Ahead in Conjunctive Cells: An Entorhinal Mechanism for Vector-Based Navigation
Kubie, J. L., & Fenton, A. A. (2012) · Frontiers in Neural Circuits · doi:10.3389/fncir.2012.00020 · Cited by 84
Partially segregated neural networks for spatial and contextual memory in virtual navigation
Rauchs, G., Orban, P., Balteau, E., Schmidt, C., Degueldre, C., Luxen, A., Maquet, P., & Peigneux, P. (2008) · Hippocampus · doi:10.1002/hipo.20411 · Cited by 84
Spatial Learning and Action Planning in a Prefrontal Cortical Network Model
Martinet, L., Sheynikhovich, D., Benchenane, K., & Arleo, A. (2011) · PLoS Computational Biology · doi:10.1371/journal.pcbi.1002045 · Cited by 84
Evensmoen, H. R., Lehn, H., Xu, J., Witter, M. P., Nadel, L., & Haberg, A. K. (2013) · Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience · doi:10.1162/jocn_a_00436 · Cited by 83
Memory for places: A navigational model in support of Marr's theory of hippocampal function
Recce, M. L., & Harris, K. D. (1996) · Hippocampus · doi:10.1002/(sici)1098-1063(1996)6:6 · Cited by 78
Animat navigation using a cognitive graph
Trullier, O., & Meyer, J.-A. (2000) · Biological Cybernetics · doi:10.1007/s004220000170 · Cited by 78
Persistent posterior and transient anterior medial temporal lobe activity during navigation
Xu, J., Evensmoen, H. R., Lehn, H., Pintzka, C. W. S., & Haberg, A. K. (2010) · NeuroImage · doi:10.1016/j.neuroimage.2010.05.074 · Cited by 59
Neural decoding of goal locations in spatial navigation in humans with fMRI
Rodriguez, P. F. (2009) · Human Brain Mapping · doi:10.1002/hbm.20873 · Cited by 50
Heading‐vector navigation based on head‐direction cells and path integration
Kubie, J. L., & Fenton, A. A. (2008) · Hippocampus · doi:10.1002/hipo.20532 · Cited by 48
Iaria, G., Fox, C. J., Chen, J., Petrides, M., & Barton, J. J. S. (2008) · European Journal of Neuroscience · doi:10.1111/j.1460-9568.2008.06060.x · Cited by 45
Using hippocampal-striatal loops for spatial navigation and goal-directed decision-making
Chersi, F., & Pezzulo, G. (2012) · Cognitive Processing · doi:10.1007/s10339-012-0475-7 · Cited by 36
The dynamic nature of spatial encoding in the hippocampus.
Bilkey, D. K., & Clearwater, J. M. (2005) · Behavioral Neuroscience · doi:10.1037/0735-7044.119.6.1533 · Cited by 17
Distance coding strategies based on the entorhinal grid cell system
Huhn, Z., Somogyvári, Z., Kiss, T., & Érdi, P. (2009) · Neural Networks · doi:10.1016/j.neunet.2009.06.029 · Cited by 7
Matsumoto, J., Makino, Y., Miura, H., & Yano, M. (2011) · Biological Cybernetics · doi:10.1007/s00422-011-0454-6 · Cited by 4
Flagged first, then by citations
1 of the 49 references couldn’t be matched to a known paper.
Cited by
Sorted by citations
Episodic memory and beyond: the hippocampus and neocortex in transformation
Moscovitch, M., Cabeza, R., Winocur, G., & Nadel, L. (2016) · Annual Review of Psychology · doi:10.1146/annurev-psych-113011-143733 · Cited by 1,062
The cognitive map in humans: spatial navigation and beyond
Epstein, R. A., Patai, E. Z., Julian, J. B., & Spiers, H. J. (2017) · Nature Neuroscience · doi:10.1038/nn.4656 · Cited by 921
Self-citationRedish, A. D. (2016) · Nature reviews. Neuroscience · doi:10.1038/nrn.2015.30 · Cited by 485
Space and Time: The Hippocampus as a Sequence Generator
Buzsáki, G., & Tingley, D. (2018) · Trends in Cognitive Sciences · doi:10.1016/j.tics.2018.07.006 · Cited by 461
A map of abstract relational knowledge in the human hippocampal-entorhinal cortex
Garvert, M. M., Dolan, R. J., & Behrens, T. E. (2017) · eLife · doi:10.7554/elife.17086 · Cited by 379
Metadata
- Authors
- Howard, L. R., Javadi, A. H., Yu, Y., Mill, R. D., Morrison, L. C., Knight, R., Loftus, M. M., Staskute, L., & Spiers, H. J.
- Affiliations
- German Center for Neurodegenerative Diseases (DE)
- University College London (GB)
- University of St Andrews (GB)
- University of Hertfordshire (GB)
- Corresponding author
- Spiers, Hugo J.
- Venue
- Current Biology
- Publisher
- Elsevier BV
- Published
- 2014-06
- Volume
- 24
- Issue
- 12
- Pages
- 1331-1340
- ISSN
- 0960-9822 (ISSN-L)
- PMC
- PMC4062938
- OpenAlex
- W2098497273
- Cited by
- 298
- References
- 49
- Citations by year
- 2026: 18 · 2025: 29 · 2024: 30 · 2023: 29 · 2022: 24 · 2021: 22 · 2020: 24 · 2019: 27 · 2018: 31 · 2017: 28 · 2016: 18 · 2015: 14 · 2014: 3
- FWCI
- 11.72
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- hybrid
- doi.org
- Locations
- Current Biology (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- Europe PMC (PubMed Central) (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- PubMed Central (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Kent Academic Repository (University of Kent) (acceptedVersion)
- University of Hertfordshire Research Archive (University of Hertfordshire) (acceptedVersion)
- UCL Discovery (University College London) (submittedVersion)
- DZNE Pub (submittedVersion)
- University of Hertfordshire Research Archive (University of Hertfordshire) (submittedVersion, cc-by)
- Funders
- James S. McDonnell Foundation
- Wellcome Trust (094850/Z/10/Z, 094850)
- Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council
- Topics
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Memory and Neural Mechanisms
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Experimental and Cognitive Psychology › Spatial Cognition and Navigation
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Memory Processes and Influences
- Keywords
- hippocampus, entorhinal cortex, path distance, Euclidean distance, spatial navigation, goal-directed navigation, vector representation, medial temporal lobe, external cues, spatial memory
- MeSH terms
- Adult, Cues, Hippocampus, Humans, London, Male, Orientation, Temporal Lobe, Entorhinal Cortex, Young Adult, Spatial Navigation
About these checks
Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.
Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.
Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.
What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›
Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review
