Regionally selective requirement for D(1)/D(5) dopaminergic neurotransmission in the medial prefrontal cortex in object-in-place associative recognition memory

Object-in-place (OiP) memory is critical for remembering the location in which an object was last encountered and depends conjointly on the medial prefrontal cortex, perirhinal cortex, and hippocampus. Here we examined the role of dopamine D(1)/D(5) receptor neurotransmission within these brain regions for OiP memory. Bilateral infusion of D(1)/D(5) receptor antagonists SCH23390 or SKF83566 into the medial prefrontal cortex, prior to memory acquisition, impaired OiP performance following a 5 min or 1 h delay. Retrieval was unaffected. Intraperirhinal or intrahippocampal infusions of SCH23390 had no effect. These results reveal a selective role for D(1)/D(5) receptors in the mPFC during OiP memory encoding.