How do our brains determine whether something is good or bad? How is this computational goal implemented in biological systems? Given the critical importance of valence processing for survival, the ...brain has evolved multiple strategies to solve this problem at different levels. The psychological concept of “emotional valence” is now beginning to find grounding in neuroscience. This review aims to bridge the gap between psychology and neuroscience on the topic of emotional valence processing. Here, I highlight a subset of studies that exemplify circuit motifs that repeatedly appear as implementational systems in valence processing. The motifs I identify as being important in valence processing include (1) Labeled Lines, (2) Divergent Paths, (3) Opposing Components, and (4) Neuromodulatory Gain. Importantly, the functionality of neural substrates in valence processing is dynamic, context-dependent, and changing across short and long timescales due to synaptic plasticity, competing mechanisms, and homeostatic need.
Tye revisits the theoretical concept of valence originating from psychology to the investigation of valence processing in neuroscience. Tye identifies several neural circuit motifs for valence processing to provide a conceptual framework for valence processing on the implementational level.
The basolateral amygdala (BLA) and ventral hippocampus (vHPC) have both been implicated in mediating anxiety-related behaviors, but the functional contribution of BLA inputs to the vHPC has never ...been directly investigated. Here we show that activation of BLA-vHPC synapses acutely and robustly increased anxiety-related behaviors, while inhibition of BLA-vHPC synapses decreased anxiety-related behaviors. We combined optogenetic approaches with in vivo pharmacological manipulations and ex vivo whole-cell patch-clamp recordings to dissect the local circuit mechanisms, demonstrating that activation of BLA terminals in the vHPC provided monosynaptic, glutamatergic inputs to vHPC pyramidal neurons. Furthermore, BLA inputs exerted polysynaptic, inhibitory effects mediated by local interneurons in the vHPC that may serve to balance the circuit locally. These data establish a role for BLA-vHPC synapses in bidirectionally controlling anxiety-related behaviors in an immediate, yet reversible, manner and a model for the local circuit mechanism of BLA inputs in the vHPC.
•Optogenetic inhibition of BLA-vHPC projections reduces anxiety•Optogenetic activation of BLA-vHPC inputs is sufficient to increase anxiety•In vivo and ex vivo evidence shows glutamatergic inputs are monosynaptic•BLA influences vHPC pyramidal cells via direct excitation and indirect inhibition
Felix-Ortiz et al. explore the interaction between the amygdala and other brain regions, assessing the functional contribution of basolateral amygdala inputs to the ventral hippocampus during anxiety-related behaviors in mice. They demonstrate bidirectional modulation of anxiety-related behaviors by these inputs.
Optogenetic tools have provided a new way to establish causal relationships between brain activity and behaviour in health and disease. Although no animal model captures human disease precisely, ...behaviours that recapitulate disease symptoms may be elicited and modulated by optogenetic methods, including behaviours that are relevant to anxiety, fear, depression, addiction, autism and parkinsonism. The rapid proliferation of optogenetic reagents together with the swift advancement of strategies for implementation has created new opportunities for causal and precise dissection of the circuits underlying brain diseases in animal models.
Neural mechanisms of social homeostasis Matthews, Gillian A.; Tye, Kay M.
Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences,
December 2019, Letnik:
1457, Številka:
1
Journal Article
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Social connections are vital to survival throughout the animal kingdom and are dynamic across the life span. There are debilitating consequences of social isolation and loneliness, and social support ...is increasingly a primary consideration in health care, disease prevention, and recovery. Considering social connection as an “innate need,” it is hypothesized that evolutionarily conserved neural systems underlie the maintenance of social connections: alerting the individual to their absence and coordinating effector mechanisms to restore social contact. This is reminiscent of a homeostatic system designed to maintain social connection. Here, we explore the identity of neural systems regulating “social homeostasis.” We review findings from rodent studies evaluating the rapid response to social deficit (in the form of acute social isolation) and propose that parallel, overlapping circuits are engaged to adapt to the vulnerabilities of isolation and restore social connection. By considering the neural systems regulating other homeostatic needs, such as energy and fluid balance, we discuss the potential attributes of social homeostatic circuitry. We reason that uncovering the identity of these circuits/mechanisms will facilitate our understanding of how loneliness perpetuates long‐term disease states, which we speculate may result from sustained recruitment of social homeostatic circuits.
Here, we explore the identity of neural systems regulating “social homeostasis.” We review findings from rodent studies evaluating the rapid response to social deficit (in the form of acute social isolation) and propose that parallel, overlapping circuits are engaged to adapt to the vulnerabilities of isolation and restore social connection. By considering the neural systems regulating other homeostatic needs, such as energy and fluid balance, we discuss the potential attributes of social homeostatic circuitry.
From circuits to behaviour in the amygdala Janak, Patricia H; Tye, Kay M
Nature (London),
2015-Jan-15, 2015-01-15, 20150115, Letnik:
517, Številka:
7534
Journal Article
Recenzirano
Odprti dostop
The amygdala has long been associated with emotion and motivation, playing an essential part in processing both fearful and rewarding environmental stimuli. How can a single structure be crucial for ...such different functions? With recent technological advances that allow for causal investigations of specific neural circuit elements, we can now begin to map the complex anatomical connections of the amygdala onto behavioural function. Understanding how the amygdala contributes to a wide array of behaviours requires the study of distinct amygdala circuits.
Projections from the lateral hypothalamus (LH) to the ventral tegmental area (VTA), containing both GABAergic and glutamatergic components, encode conditioned responses and control compulsive ...reward-seeking behavior. GABAergic neurons in the LH have been shown to mediate appetitive and feeding-related behaviors. Here we show that the GABAergic component of the LH-VTA pathway supports positive reinforcement and place preference, while the glutamatergic component mediates place avoidance. In addition, our results indicate that photoactivation of these projections modulates other behaviors, such as social interaction and perseverant investigation of a novel object. We provide evidence that photostimulation of the GABAergic LH-VTA component, but not the glutamatergic component, increases dopamine (DA) release in the nucleus accumbens (NAc) via inhibition of local VTA GABAergic neurons. Our study clarifies how GABAergic LH inputs to the VTA can contribute to generalized behavioral activation across multiple contexts, consistent with a role in increasing motivational salience.
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•Activating GABAergic LH-VTA supports positive reinforcement•GABAergic LH-VTA activation inhibits VTA GABA neurons•GABAergic LH-VTA activation increases dopamine release in the NAc•Activating glutamatergic LH-VTA causes avoidance and suppresses DA release in the NAc
Nieh et al. demonstrate that inhibitory inputs from the lateral hypothalamus disinhibit dopamine neurons in the ventral tegmental area to increase motivated behaviors, including approach and social interaction. In contrast, excitatory projections suppress dopamine release and promote avoidance.
Although anxiety disorders represent a major societal problem demanding new therapeutic targets, these efforts have languished in the absence of a mechanistic understanding of this subjective ...emotional state. While it is impossible to know with certainty the subjective experience of a rodent, rodent models hold promise in dissecting well-conserved limbic circuits. The application of modern approaches in neuroscience has already begun to unmask the neural circuit intricacies underlying anxiety by allowing direct examination of hypotheses drawn from existing psychological concepts. This information points toward an updated conceptual model for what neural circuit perturbations could give rise to pathological anxiety and thereby provides a roadmap for future therapeutic development.
Many cancer centers offer acupuncture services. To date, a comprehensive systematic review of acupuncture in cancer care has not been conducted. The purpose of this review was to evaluate the ...efficacy of acupuncture for symptom management in patients with cancer.
Medline, Embase, CINAHL, Cochrane (all databases), Scopus, and PubMed were searched from inception through December 2011 for prospective randomized clinical trials (RCT) evaluating acupuncture for symptom management in cancer care. Only studies involving needle insertion into acupuncture points were included. No language limitations were applied. Studies were assessed for risk of bias (ROB) according to Cochrane criteria. Outcomes by symptom were designated as positive, negative, or unclear.
A total of 2,151 publications were screened. Of those, 41 RCTs involving eight symptoms (pain, nausea, hot flashes, fatigue, radiation-induced xerostomia, prolonged postoperative ileus, anxiety/mood disorders, and sleep disturbance) met all inclusion criteria. One positive trial of acupuncture for chemotherapy-induced nausea and vomiting had low ROB. Of the remaining studies, eight had unclear ROB (four positive, three negative, and one with unclear outcomes). Thirty-three studies had high ROB (19 positive, 11 negative, and three with both positive and negative outcomes depending on the symptom).
Acupuncture is an appropriate adjunctive treatment for chemotherapy-induced nausea/vomiting, but additional studies are needed. For other symptoms, efficacy remains undetermined owing to high ROB among studies. Future research should focus on standardizing comparison groups and treatment methods, be at least single-blinded, assess biologic mechanisms, have adequate statistical power, and involve multiple acupuncturists.
Although the basolateral amygdala (BLA) is known to play a critical role in the formation of memories of both positive and negative valence, the coding and routing of valence-related information is ...poorly understood. Here, we recorded BLA neurons during the retrieval of associative memories and used optogenetic-mediated phototagging to identify populations of neurons that synapse in the nucleus accumbens (NAc), the central amygdala (CeA), or ventral hippocampus (vHPC). We found that despite heterogeneous neural responses within each population, the proportions of BLA-NAc neurons excited by reward predictive cues and of BLA-CeA neurons excited by aversion predictive cues were higher than within the entire BLA. Although the BLA-vHPC projection is known to drive behaviors of innate negative valence, these neurons did not preferentially code for learned negative valence. Together, these findings suggest that valence encoding in the BLA is at least partially mediated via divergent activity of anatomically defined neural populations.
•BLA-NAc and BLA-CeA cell populations encode valence distinctly, yet are heterogeneous•More BLA-NAc neurons were excited by the sucrose predictive cue than the BLA overall•More BLA-CeA neurons were excited by the quinine predictive cue than the BLA overall•BLA-vHPC neurons responded to cues of positive and negative valence evenly
Beyeler et al. reveal the real-time neural coding dynamics within the basolateral amygdala to show that neural responses to cues that predict rewarding or aversive outcomes differ depending on the anatomical projection target of each neuronal subpopulation.
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