研究課題
In Heisei 26 we made continued progress on understanding how fear memories are triggered and the strength of these memories is set. For the first set of experiments we recorded electrophysiologically from single neurons in the amygdala while optogenetically silencing amygdala synaptic terminals in the ventrolateral portion of the periaqueductal gray (PAG). Specifically, we presented animals with unpredicted and predicted shocks along with predicted shock accompanied by optical silencing of amygdala-PAG terminals. Though we are finalizing these experiments now, the evidence we've gathered suggests that optogenetic silencing of amygdala inputs to the PAG disinhibited shock evoked responses in amygdala neurons, demonstrating a causal role for this circuit in prediction error coding in amygdala neurons. We then optogenetically silenced the amygdala-PAG pathway during fear learning and found that it increased the strength of fear memories.Together these studies demonstrate that an amygdala-PAG pathway controls the strength of fear memories by setting prediction error coding in amygdala neurons.
3: やや遅れている
Progress was smooth, but one piece of equipment broke which slowed progress on inhibition of amygdala to PAG experiments.
Finalizing optogenetic experiments on inhibition of amygdala inputs to PAG on prediction error coding in amygdala
Some experimental equipment (lasers and a commutator) unexpectedly needed to be repaired last year. This slowed our progress on grant work and some money was left unspent.
We will use this money to buy consummables which are necessary to complete optogenetics experiments.
すべて 2015 2014 その他
すべて 雑誌論文 (3件) (うち査読あり 2件、 オープンアクセス 2件、 謝辞記載あり 2件) 学会発表 (13件) (うち招待講演 11件) 備考 (1件)
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
巻: 111(51) ページ: E5584-92
Nature Neuroscience
巻: 17(12) ページ: 1644-54
Current Biology
巻: 24 (15) ページ: R690-3
http://jlab.brain.riken.jp/
