Expression of a heroin contextually conditioned immune effect in male rats requires CaMKIIα-expressing neurons in dorsal, but not ventral, subiculum and hippocampal CA1.

ABSTRACT: The physiological and motivational effects of heroin and other abused drugs become associated with environmental (contextual) stimuli during repeated drug use. As a result, these contextual stimuli gain the ability to elicit drug-like conditioned effects. For example, after context-heroin pairings, exposure to the heroin-paired context alone produces similar effects on peripheral immune function as heroin itself. Conditioned immune effects can significantly exacerbate the adverse health consequences of heroin use. Our laboratory has shown that exposure to a heroin-paired context suppresses lipopolysaccharide (LPS)-induced splenic nitric oxide (NO) production in male rats, and this effect is mediated in part by the dorsal hippocampus (dHpc). However, specific dHpc output regions, whose effe

SUBMITTER: Lebonville CL 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7572614 | biostudies-literature | 2020 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature