Anterograde amnesia is a loss of the ability to create new
memories after the event that caused the
amnesia, leading to a partial or complete inability to recall the recent past, while long-term memories from before the event remain intact. This is in contrast to
retrograde amnesia, where memories created prior to the event are lost while new memories can still be created. Both can occur together in the same patient. To a large degree, anterograde amnesia remains a mysterious ailment because the precise mechanism of
storing memories is not yet well understood, although it is known that the regions involved are certain sites in the
temporal cortex, especially in the
hippocampus and nearby
subcortical regions.