Neuronal mechanisms of synaptic plasticity in the amygdala

2016 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 25430015
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C)
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Section: 一般
• Research Field: Neurophysiology / General neuroscience
• Research Institution: Jikei University School of Medicine
• Principal Investigator: Watabe Ayako 東京慈恵会医科大学, 医学部, 准教授 (00334277)
• Research Collaborator: KATO Fusao ; TAKAHASHI Yukari
• Project Period (FY): 2013-04-01 – 2017-03-31
• Keywords: マウス / 情動 / 扁桃体 / 痛み

Outline of Final Research Achievements

Pavlovian fear conditioning is accomplished by associating a conditioning stimulus (CS) and an unconditioned stimulus (US). While CS-US associations occur in the amygdala, the pathway mediating US signal has not been well identified. The lateral parabrachial nucleus (lPB) is well situated for providing US information to the central amygdala (CeA). Therefore, we manipulated the lPB-CeA pathway to examine its role in fear learning. First, transient inactivation of lPB during the conditioning with muscimol (MUS) significantly attenuated the freezing ratio on the retrieval test, suggesting that lPB activity is required for fear learning. Next, we injected channelrhodopsin2 expressing adeno-associated virus (AAV) into lPB. Selective stimulation of the lPB-CeA pathway in association with CS successfully created artificial fear memory without foot-shock. These results suggest that selective stimulation of the lPB-CeA pathway substitutes for the US to induce fear learning.

Free Research Field

神経科学、神経行動学、神経生理学