Physical activity simultaneously improves working memory and ripple-spindle coupling

Ripples, representing the compressed reactivation of environmental information, provide a mechanism for retaining memory information in chronological order and are also crucial for working memory (WM) during wakefulness. Brief sessions of physical activity (PA) are proposed to boost WM. In concurrent EEG/MEG sessions, we investigated the role of PA in WM performance and high-frequency-ripple to wake spindle coupling. Ripples, identified in MEG sensors covering the medial temporal lobe (MTL) region, predicted individual WM performance. Ripples were locked to robust oscillatory patterns in the EEG defined spindle band. Wake spindle activity and ripples decrease during initial stimulus presentation and rebound after 1 sec. Behaviorally, PA enhanced WM performance. Neurophysiologically, PA scaled the ripple rate with the number of items to be kept in WM and strengthened the coupling between ripple events and wake spindle events. These findings reveal that PA modulates WM by coordinating ripple-spindle interaction.