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Nature Neuroscience 9, 1526–1533 (1 December 2006) | doi:10.1038/nn1801

Cannabinoids reveal importance of spike timing coordination in hippocampal function

David Robbe , Sean M Montgomery , Alexander Thome , Pavel E Rueda-Orozco , Bruce L McNaughton & Gy|[ouml]|rgy Buzsaki

Cannabinoids impair hippocampus-dependent memory in both humans and animals, but the network mechanisms responsible for this effect are unknown. Here we show that the cannabinoids |[Delta]|9-tetrahydrocannabinol and CP55940 decreased the power of theta, gamma and ripple oscillations in the hippocampus of head-restrained and freely moving rats. These effects were blocked by a CB1 antagonist. The decrease in theta power correlated with memory impairment in a hippocampus-dependent task. By simultaneously recording from large populations of single units, we found that CP55940 severely disrupted the temporal coordination of cell assemblies in short time windows (