  The spiking activity of the hippocampal place cells plays a key role in
producing and sustaining an internalized representation of the ambient
space---a cognitive map. These cells do not only exhibit location-specific
spiking during navigation, but also may rapidly replay the navigated routs
through endogenous dynamics of the hippocampal network. Physiologically, such
reactivations are viewed as manifestations of "memory replays" that help to
learn new information and to consolidate previously acquired memories by
reinforcing synapses in the parahippocampal networks. Below we propose a
computational model of these processes that allows assessing the effect of
replays on acquiring a robust topological map of the environment and
demonstrate that replays may play a key role in stabilizing the hippocampal
representation of space.
