Instrumental aversion coding in the basolateral amygdala and its reversion by a benzodiazepine.

ABSTRACT: Punishment involves learning the relationship between actions and their adverse consequences. Both the acquisition and expression of punishment learning depend on the basolateral amygdala (BLA), but how BLA supports punishment remains poorly understood. To address this, we measured calcium (Ca²⁺) transients in BLA principal neurons during punishment. Male rats were trained to press two individually presented levers for food; when one of these levers also yielded aversive footshock, responding on this punished lever decreased relative to the other, unpunished lever. In rats with the Ca²⁺ indicator GCaMP6f targeted to BLA principal neurons, we observed excitatory activity transients to the footshock punisher and inhibitory transients to lever-presses earning a reward. C

SUBMITTER: Jean-Richard-Dit-Bressel P 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC9018846 | biostudies-literature | 2022 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature