An amygdala circuit that suppresses social engagement.

ABSTRACT: Innate social behaviours, such as mating and fighting, are fundamental to animal reproduction and survival¹. However, social engagements can also put an individual at risk². Little is known about the neural mechanisms that enable appropriate risk assessment and the suppression of hazardous social interactions. Here we identify the posteromedial nucleus of the cortical amygdala (COApm) as a locus required for the suppression of male mating when a female mouse is unhealthy. Using anatomical tracing, functional imaging and circuit-level epistatic analyses, we show that suppression of mating with an unhealthy female is mediated by the COApm projections onto the glutamatergic population of the medial amygdalar nucleus (MEA). We further show that the role of the COApm-to-ME

SUBMITTER: Kwon JT 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC9251649 | biostudies-literature | 2021 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature