Neuronal Representation of Social Information in the Medial Amygdala of Awake Behaving Mice.

ABSTRACT: The medial amygdala (MeA) plays a critical role in processing species- and sex-specific signals that trigger social and defensive behaviors. However, the principles by which this deep brain structure encodes social information is poorly understood. We used a miniature microscope to image the Ca²⁺ dynamics of large neural ensembles in awake behaving mice and tracked the responses of MeA neurons over several months. These recordings revealed spatially intermingled subsets of MeA neurons with distinct temporal dynamics. The encoding of social information in the MeA differed between males and females and relied on information from both individual cells and neuronal populations. By performing long-term Ca²⁺ imaging across different social contexts, we found that sexual exp

SUBMITTER: Li Y 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5731476 | biostudies-literature | 2017 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature