Abstract

The long-term objective of the proposed research is to understand how the brain establishes and maintains emotional memories. In previous studies pathways that are essential for the classical conditioning of emotional memories by pairing an acoustic conditioned stimulus with an aversive unconditioned stimulus were identified. An essential structure in this circuitry is the amygdala. The proposed experiments will attempt to identify cellular mechanisms in the amygdala that underlie emotional conditioning. In particular, the focus is on synaptic interactions between amygdala neurons and their inputs from auditory processing areas of the thalamus. The goals are to determine whether the excitatory amino acid, glutamate, is present in the pathway and, if so, to determine whether this substances contributes to neurotransmission, synaptic plasticity and emotional learning. To achieve these goals light and electron microscopic anatomical studies, unit recording neurophysiological studies, and behavioral studies will be performed. The results of these experiments should begin to take our understanding of emotional learning to the level of detailed neural circuits and their synapses and could help in the understanding and treatment of emotional disorders.

  Funding Agency

Agency
National Institute of Health (NIH)
Institute
National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH)
Type
Research Project (R01)
Project #
5R01MH046516-04
Application #
2247093
Study Section
Neurosciences Research Review Committee (BPN)
Project Start
1991-04-01
Project End
1996-03-31
Budget Start
1994-04-01
Budget End
1995-03-31
Support Year
4
Fiscal Year
1994
Total Cost
Indirect Cost

  Institution

Name
New York University
Department
Neurology
Type
Schools of Arts and Sciences
DUNS #
004514360
City
New York
State
NY
Country
United States
Zip Code
10012

  Publications

Díaz-Mataix, Lorenzo; Piper, Walter T; Schiff, Hillary C et al. (2017) Characterization of the amplificatory effect of norepinephrine in the acquisition of Pavlovian threat associations. Learn Mem 24:432-439
Campese, Vincent D; Soroeta, Jose M; Vazey, Elena M et al. (2017) Noradrenergic Regulation of Central Amygdala in Aversive Pavlovian-to-Instrumental Transfer. eNeuro 4:
Dallérac, Glenn; Graupner, Michael; Knippenberg, Jeroen et al. (2017) Updating temporal expectancy of an aversive event engages striatal plasticity under amygdala control. Nat Commun 8:13920
Schiff, Hillary C; Johansen, Joshua P; Hou, Mian et al. (2017) ?-Adrenergic Receptors Regulate the Acquisition and Consolidation Phases of Aversive Memory Formation Through Distinct, Temporally Regulated Signaling Pathways. Neuropsychopharmacology 42:895-903
Wigestrand, Mattis B; Schiff, Hillary C; Fyhn, Marianne et al. (2017) Primary auditory cortex regulates threat memory specificity. Learn Mem 24:55-58
Madarasz, Tamas J; Diaz-Mataix, Lorenzo; Akhand, Omar et al. (2016) Evaluation of ambiguous associations in the amygdala by learning the structure of the environment. Nat Neurosci 19:965-72
Johansen, Joshua P; Diaz-Mataix, Lorenzo; Hamanaka, Hiroki et al. (2014) Hebbian and neuromodulatory mechanisms interact to trigger associative memory formation. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A 111:E5584-92
Ostroff, Linnaea E; Manzur, Mustfa K; Cain, Christopher K et al. (2014) Synapses lacking astrocyte appear in the amygdala during consolidation of Pavlovian threat conditioning. J Comp Neurol 522:2152-63
Cowansage, Kiriana K; Bush, David E A; Josselyn, Sheena A et al. (2013) Basal variability in CREB phosphorylation predicts trait-like differences in amygdala-dependent memory. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A 110:16645-50
Martinez, Raquel C R; Gupta, Nikita; Lázaro-Muñoz, Gabriel et al. (2013) Active vs. reactive threat responding is associated with differential c-Fos expression in specific regions of amygdala and prefrontal cortex. Learn Mem 20:446-52

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