Researchers investigating the role of neural cliques have gained insight into the process of storing memories in the brain.
Although several studies converges in the demonstration that real-time patterns of memory traces and sensory inputs are retained in the form of neural cliques, the topic is currently in active research in order to fully understand this biological code.
Hebb proposed in 1949 that information in the brain would need to involve the coordinated activity of multiple neuronal cells, termed engrams or neuronal cells assemblies, in order to achieve reliable information encoding and restitution,[dubious – discuss] and putting forward Hebb's Rule as a fundamental mechanism for the coordination of activity.
The activity patterns associated with certain startling experiences recurred spontaneously—at intervals ranging from seconds to minutes after the actual event—that showed similar trajectories, including the characteristic geometric shape, but with smaller amplitudes than their original responses.
This model demonstrates the usefulness of cliques, by allowing the reconstruction of a full memory from a partial or corrupted input, even with unreliable synapses and neurons, and providing an explanation for associative train of thoughts when pre-cueing subjects with a familiar sensory stimuli (e.g., Proust's madeleine).