{
  "abstract": "Cognitive effort is closely linked to prefrontal control, but the control demands imposed by working memory remain poorly understood at the level of neural circuits. We formulated frontoparietal regulation as a feedback-control problem in a conductance-based spiking network comprising an intraparietal ring attractor and a recurrent dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (dlPFC) actuator. A local data-driven task-actuator model was identified around the cue-offset mnemonic state and used to design linear-quadratic regulation. Increasing memory load produced a strong monotonic rise in realized post-cue control effort, driven primarily by sustained dlPFC recruitment. Cue-aligned selective routing supported higher mnemonic loads with substantially less control effort than spatially nonspecific routing. Mean-matched open-loop stimulation reproduced much of the nominal retention benefit, whereas state-dependent feedback provided greater robustness when mnemonic activity was perturbed. Finite-horizon analysis revealed a strongly anisotropic, effectively low-dimensional control geometry dominated by a common mnemonic direction, with much weaker access to item-differentiating directions. These results link increasing working-memory demand to greater sustained prefrontal control requirements and show how frontoparietal routing geometry shapes the efficiency and robustness of mnemonic regulation.",
  "abstract_shown": true,
  "affiliations": [
    "Ghent University"
  ],
  "article_type": "New results",
  "arxiv": null,
  "author_total": 2,
  "authors": [
    {
      "affs": [
        0
      ],
      "name": "T. Gholaminejad"
    },
    {
      "name": "C. B. Holroyd"
    }
  ],
  "bibtex": "https://research.draconitic.com/paper/dg5p7gnjts8pw.bib",
  "cited_by": 0,
  "doi": "10.64898/2026.10.11.758303",
  "fulltext_url": "https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.10.11.758303v1.full",
  "id": "dg5p7gnjts8pw",
  "issns": [],
  "landing_url": "https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.10.11.758303v1",
  "language": null,
  "licence": "CC-BY",
  "licence_label": "CC BY",
  "licence_source": "article",
  "licence_url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/",
  "metadata_licence": null,
  "native_subjects": [
    [
      "biorxiv",
      "neuroscience"
    ],
    [
      "openalex",
      "2805|Neural dynamics and brain function"
    ]
  ],
  "openalex": "W7221702171",
  "pdf_url": "https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.10.11.758303v1.full.pdf",
  "pmcid": null,
  "pmid": null,
  "published": "2026-10-11",
  "publisher": null,
  "ris": "https://research.draconitic.com/paper/dg5p7gnjts8pw.ris",
  "sources": [
    {
      "first_seen": "2026-10-30T12:27:35Z",
      "native_id": "10.64898/2026.10.11.758303",
      "source": "biorxiv",
      "url": "https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.10.11.758303v1"
    }
  ],
  "subjects": [
    {
      "field": "biology",
      "origin": "biorxiv:neuroscience",
      "subfield": "neuroscience"
    }
  ],
  "title": "A Control-Theoretic Account of Cognitive Effort in Working Memory",
  "title_text": "A Control-Theoretic Account of Cognitive Effort in Working Memory",
  "type": "preprint",
  "updated_at": "2026-10-30T12:27:35Z",
  "url": "https://research.draconitic.com/paper/dg5p7gnjts8pw",
  "venue": "bioRxiv",
  "versions": []
}