Cell Rep 2022 05;39(5):110775
Department of Physiology and Biophysics, University of California, Irvine, Irvine, CA 92617, USA; Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences, University of California, Irvine, Irvine, CA 92617, USA; Department of Biomedical Engineering, University of California, Irvine, Irvine, CA 92617, USA; Department of Neurobiology and Behavior, University of California, Irvine, Irvine, CA 92617, USA; Center for the Neurobiology of Learning and Memory, University of California, Irvine, Irvine, CA 92617, USA; UCI Mind, University of California, Irvine, Irvine, CA 92617, USA. Electronic address:
Although midbrain dopamine (DA) circuits are central to motivated behaviors, our knowledge of how experience modifies these circuits to facilitate subsequent behavioral adaptations is limited. Here we demonstrate the selective role of a ventral tegmental area DA projection to the amygdala (VTA→amygdala) for cocaine-induced anxiety but not cocaine reward or sensitization. Our rabies virus-mediated circuit mapping approach reveals a persistent elevation in spontaneous and task-related activity of inhibitory GABAergic cells from the bed nucleus of the stria terminalis (BNST) and downstream VTA→amygdala cells that can be detected even after a single cocaine exposure. Read More