on004117
NEMAR copy of ds004117

Sternberg Working Memory

This dataset contains scalp EEG recordings from 23 healthy young adults performing a Modified Sternberg Working Memory task, in which participants memorized subsets of letters while ignoring others, then responded to probe letters after a maintenance period. The study, conducted at the Swartz Center for Neural Computation (UCSD) in 2004-05, was designed to examine source-resolved EEG brain dynamics related to working memory encoding, maintenance, and retrieval. The dataset was curated and annotated using the Hierarchical Event Descriptors (HED) framework and shared via OpenNeuro and NEMAR in BIDS format.

EEG
Issues GitHub OpenNeuro ds004117

Download this dataset

Pick a method. Large datasets skip the zip and use the streaming methods below — all resumable. Full download guide →

  1. Download archive (.zip) — 3.2 GB

    A single zip of the published version. Best for small/medium datasets.

    Download zip

  2. NEMAR CLI recommended

    Pulls the pinned version + annexed data and resumes cleanly. Install nemar-cli → 

    nemar dataset download on004117
  3. DataLad

    Clone the dataset repo and fetch file content on demand. Docs → 

    datalad clone https://github.com/nemarDatasets/on004117 on004117
cd on004117 && datalad get .
  4. git-annex

    Plain git + git-annex against the dataset repo. Docs → 

    git clone https://github.com/nemarDatasets/on004117 on004117
cd on004117 && git annex get .
  5. Direct files (wget / curl / rclone)

    Every file with a stable, range-resumable URL from the manifest. Needs curl, jq, wget (or rclone/aria2c). Docs → 

    curl -s https://data.nemar.org/on004117/v1.0.0/manifest.json | jq -r '.[].bytes_url' > urls.txt
wget -xc -i urls.txt

Compute on this dataset

Two routes today, with a third (in-browser one-click submission) landing soon.

  1. NeuroScience Gateway (NSG) portal.

    NSG runs EEGLAB / Brainstorm / MNE pipelines on supercomputing time donated by SDSC. Create an account, point a job at this dataset's S3 prefix (s3://nemar/on004117), and submit.
    nsgportal.org →

  2. Local processing with nemar-cli.

    Pull the dataset to your machine and run any toolbox locally. Honors the published version pinning. 

    npm install -g nemar-cli
nemar dataset clone on004117
cd on004117 && nemar dataset get
  3. Just the files.

    rclone, aria2c, or any HTTPS client works against data.nemar.org/on004117/ — the manifest carries presigned S3 URLs.

Direct compute access is coming soon. One-click NSG submission from this page is scoped for a follow-up phase. Tracked on nemarOrg/website#6.

Citations

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    Files

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    Signal viewer
    How to use the data (for agentic research) license, citation, download commands

    What it is

    Modalities
    EEG
    Participants
    23
    Size
    5.80 GB
    Tasks
    WorkingMemory
    HED version
    8.0.0

    License and terms

    License
    CC0
    Recommended citation
    (data), J. O., curation), S. M. (. A., curation), A. D. (. A., (curation), D. T., & (curation), K. R. (2026). Sternberg Working Memory (Version v1.0.0) [Data set]. NEMAR. https://doi.org/10.82901/nemar.on004117
    Reference
    https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neuroimage.2005.04.014.

    Where the bytes are

    Latest version (always current)
    https://data.nemar.org/on004117/latest/
    This version (v1.0.0)
    https://data.nemar.org/on004117/v1.0.0/

    How to download

    The dataset
    nemar dataset download on004117 Clones and fetches in one step. Content under stimuli/ and derivatives/ is skipped by default because those trees can be large; add --stimuli --derivatives for the whole thing.
    A subset, one step
    nemar dataset download on004117 --subjects sub-01,02 Also filters by --sessions, --tasks, --runs, --datatypes, --include and --exclude.
    A subset, step 1
    nemar dataset clone on004117 Clones git-annex pointers only; fetches no file content. Creates ./on004117.
    A subset, step 2
    cd on004117 The get command below reads the clone's annex, so it only works from inside the clone.
    A subset, step 3
    nemar dataset get <files> Pulls the files you actually need. Skips stimuli/ and derivatives/ unless the path you ask for is under one of them.
    One small file
    https://data.nemar.org/on004117/v1.0.0/participants.tsv A direct HTTPS fetch works for any single file.

    Assess fit without downloading

    Participants table
    https://data.nemar.org/on004117/v1.0.0/participants.tsv
    Dataset description
    https://data.nemar.org/on004117/v1.0.0/dataset_description.json
    Directory listing
    https://data.nemar.org/on004117/v1.0.0/?format=json
    Catalog record
    https://api.nemar.org/datasets/on004117