In conclusion, by employing a novel combination of fMRI, functional connectivity, and a graph theory approach, our study provides a new perspective on how the human brain processes episodic memories. Our data provide novel support for models that emphasize global network interactions, rather than regionally mediated activity alone, as central to how we recover spatial and temporal memories associated with recent experiences. Our results nonetheless emphasize the importance of the hippocampus in particular as a convergence hub in this process, consistent with decades of research demonstrating its importance to episodic memory. Our results thus suggest that while prefrontal and parietal areas communicate with the hippocampus during spatiotemporal memory retrieval, the hippocampus acts as a critical convergence “hub” during successful context retrieval.
