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Selective Control of Fear Expression by Optogenetic Manipulation of Infralimbic Cortex after Extinction
- Source :
- Neuropsychopharmacology. 41:1261-1273
- Publication Year :
- 2015
- Publisher :
- Springer Science and Business Media LLC, 2015.
-
Abstract
- Evidence from rodent and human studies has identified the ventromedial prefrontal cortex, specifically the infralimbic cortex (IL), as a critical brain structure in the extinction of conditioned fear. However, how IL activity controls fear expression at the time of extinction memory retrieval is unclear and controversial. To address this issue, we used optogenetics to precisely manipulate the activity of genetically targeted cells and to examine the real-time contribution of IL activity to expression of auditory-conditioned fear extinction in mice. We found that inactivation of IL, but not prelimbic cortex, impaired extinction retrieval. Conversely, photostimulation of IL excitatory neurons robustly enhanced the inhibition of fear expression after extinction, but not before extinction. Moreover, this effect was specific to the conditioned stimulus (CS): IL activity had no effect on expression of fear in response to the conditioned context after auditory fear extinction. Thus, in contrast to the expectation from a generally held view, artificial activation of IL produced no significant effect on expression of non-extinguished conditioned fear. Therefore, our data provide compelling evidence that IL activity is critical for expression of fear extinction and establish a causal role for IL activity in controlling fear expression in a CS-specific manner after extinction. NRF (Natl Research Foundation, S’pore) Accepted version
- Subjects :
- Male
0301 basic medicine
Conditioning, Classical
Infralimbic cortex
Ventromedial prefrontal cortex
Prefrontal Cortex
Context (language use)
Optogenetics
Extinction, Psychological
Photostimulation
Mice
03 medical and health sciences
0302 clinical medicine
medicine
Animals
optogenetics
Neurons
Pharmacology
Fear processing in the brain
Classical conditioning
Fear
social sciences
Extinction (psychology)
musculoskeletal system
humanities
Mice, Inbred C57BL
Psychiatry and Mental health
030104 developmental biology
medicine.anatomical_structure
Acoustic Stimulation
infralimbic cortex
Mental Recall
Original Article
Calcium-Calmodulin-Dependent Protein Kinase Type 2
Psychology
Neuroscience
geographic locations
030217 neurology & neurosurgery
Subjects
Details
- ISSN :
- 1740634X and 0893133X
- Volume :
- 41
- Database :
- OpenAIRE
- Journal :
- Neuropsychopharmacology
- Accession number :
- edsair.doi.dedup.....e2183b167fedff99430165ec206c7d9b
- Full Text :
- https://doi.org/10.1038/npp.2015.276