- A new paper proposes a molecular-engram model in which declarative memory is encoded in nucleic-acid sequences rather than synaptic weights, and outlines a nanopore-based cellular mechanism for “reading out” the molecular code into neural activity (https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1074742723000291).  
- Discussion questioned why the authors emphasize nanopores instead of the simpler hypothesis that local gene-expression changes modulate local neuron firing.  
- A companion preprint, “If engrams are the answer, what is the question?” (https://osf.io/preprints/psyarxiv/f6amv), was highlighted for systematically critiquing the lack of alternative theories to the synaptic-engram framework in neuroscience.  
- Participants debated the locality assumption in memory storage, invoking holographic and distributed-systems analogies (e.g., “there’s no place on a mirror where your nose is stored”) and considering whether generative AI models exhibit similar non-local information encoding.  
- Temporal-dynamics arguments were raised: whether molecular interactions can occur fast enough to account for rapid recognition processes in perception and memory.  
- The Activity-Regulated Cytoskeleton-Associated Protein (ARC) was cited as an example of RNA-based signaling between neurons, supporting the plausibility of molecular-level memory transfer (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Activity-regulated_cytoskeleton-associated_protein).  
- A 2010 Donahue quote was revisited, suggesting that neural traces may influence behavior without ever being “read” in the computational sense, prompting counter-arguments that expressed behavior itself constitutes a read-out.  
- Additional reading on memory synthesis and theoretical frameworks was shared (https://gershmanlab.com/pubs/memory_synthesis.pdf).