Breathing-driven prefrontal oscillations regulate maintenance of conditioned-fear evoked freezing independently of initiation.

ABSTRACT: Brain-body interactions are thought to be essential in emotions but their physiological basis remains poorly understood. In mice, regular 4 Hz breathing appears during freezing after cue-fear conditioning. Here we show that the olfactory bulb (OB) transmits this rhythm to the dorsomedial prefrontal cortex (dmPFC) where it organizes neural activity. Reduction of the respiratory-related 4 Hz oscillation, via bulbectomy or optogenetic perturbation of the OB, reduces freezing. Behavioural modelling shows that this is due to a specific reduction in freezing maintenance without impacting its initiation, thus dissociating these two phenomena. dmPFC LFP and firing patterns support the region's specific function in freezing maintenance. In particular, population analysis reveals that network activi

SUBMITTER: Bagur S 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8110519 | biostudies-literature | 2021 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature