Journal
SCIENCE ADVANCES
Volume 4, Issue 4, Pages -Publisher
AMER ASSOC ADVANCEMENT SCIENCE
DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.aar7328
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Funding
- NIH [MH099073]
- Ministry of Science and Information & Communication Technologies through the National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF) grant: Brain Science Research Program [NRF-2015M3C7A1028392]
- NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF MENTAL HEALTH [R01MH099073] Funding Source: NIH RePORTER
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Predation is considered a major selective pressure in the evolution of fear, but the neurophysiology of predator-induced fear is unknown. We simultaneously recorded lateral amygdala (LA) and prelimbic (PL) area neuronal activities as rats exited a safe nest to search for food in an open space before, during, and after encountering a predator robot programmed to surge from afar. Distinct populations of LA neurons transiently increased spiking as rats either advanced or fled the robot, whereas PL neurons showed longer-lasting spike trains that preceded and persisted beyond LA activity. Moreover, discrete LA-PL cell pairs displayed correlated firings only when the animals either approached or fled the robot. These results suggest a general fear function of the LA-PL circuit where the PL participates in the initial detection of potential threats, the LA signals the occurrence of real threats, and the dynamic LA-PL interaction optimizes defensive readiness for action.
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