Cargando…
Chemogenetic Activation of Astrocytes in the Basolateral Amygdala Contributes to Fear Memory Formation by Modulating the Amygdala–Prefrontal Cortex Communication
The basolateral amygdala (BLA) is one of the key brain areas involved in aversive learning, especially fear memory formation. Studies of aversive learning in the BLA have largely focused on neuronal function, while the role of BLA astrocytes in aversive learning remains largely unknown. In this stud...
Autores principales: | , , , , , , , , , |
---|---|
Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
MDPI
2022
|
Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9181030/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35682767 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijms23116092 |
_version_ | 1784723666523652096 |
---|---|
author | Lei, Zhuogui Xie, Li Li, Cheuk Hin Lam, Yuk Yan Ramkrishnan, Aruna Surendran Fu, Zhongqi Zeng, Xianlin Liu, Shu Iqbal, Zafar Li, Ying |
author_facet | Lei, Zhuogui Xie, Li Li, Cheuk Hin Lam, Yuk Yan Ramkrishnan, Aruna Surendran Fu, Zhongqi Zeng, Xianlin Liu, Shu Iqbal, Zafar Li, Ying |
author_sort | Lei, Zhuogui |
collection | PubMed |
description | The basolateral amygdala (BLA) is one of the key brain areas involved in aversive learning, especially fear memory formation. Studies of aversive learning in the BLA have largely focused on neuronal function, while the role of BLA astrocytes in aversive learning remains largely unknown. In this study, we manipulated the BLA astrocytes by expressing the Gq-coupled receptor hM3q and discovered that astrocytic Gq modulation during fear conditioning promoted auditorily cued fear memory but did not affect less stressful memory tasks or induce anxiety-like behavior. Moreover, chemogenetic activation of BLA astrocytes during memory retrieval had no effect on fear memory expression. In addition, astrocytic Gq activation increased c-Fos expression in the BLA and the medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) during fear conditioning, but not in the home cage. Combining these results with retrograde virus tracing, we found that the activity of mPFC-projecting BLA neurons showed significant enhancement after astrocytic Gq activation during fear conditioning. Electrophysiology recordings showed that activating astrocytic Gq in the BLA promoted spike-field coherence and phase locking percentage, not only within the BLA but also between the BLA and the mPFC. Finally, direct chemogenetic activation of mPFC-projecting BLA neurons during fear conditioning enhanced cued fear memory. Taken together, our data suggest that astrocytes in the BLA may contribute to aversive learning by modulating amygdala–mPFC communication. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-9181030 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2022 |
publisher | MDPI |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-91810302022-06-10 Chemogenetic Activation of Astrocytes in the Basolateral Amygdala Contributes to Fear Memory Formation by Modulating the Amygdala–Prefrontal Cortex Communication Lei, Zhuogui Xie, Li Li, Cheuk Hin Lam, Yuk Yan Ramkrishnan, Aruna Surendran Fu, Zhongqi Zeng, Xianlin Liu, Shu Iqbal, Zafar Li, Ying Int J Mol Sci Article The basolateral amygdala (BLA) is one of the key brain areas involved in aversive learning, especially fear memory formation. Studies of aversive learning in the BLA have largely focused on neuronal function, while the role of BLA astrocytes in aversive learning remains largely unknown. In this study, we manipulated the BLA astrocytes by expressing the Gq-coupled receptor hM3q and discovered that astrocytic Gq modulation during fear conditioning promoted auditorily cued fear memory but did not affect less stressful memory tasks or induce anxiety-like behavior. Moreover, chemogenetic activation of BLA astrocytes during memory retrieval had no effect on fear memory expression. In addition, astrocytic Gq activation increased c-Fos expression in the BLA and the medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) during fear conditioning, but not in the home cage. Combining these results with retrograde virus tracing, we found that the activity of mPFC-projecting BLA neurons showed significant enhancement after astrocytic Gq activation during fear conditioning. Electrophysiology recordings showed that activating astrocytic Gq in the BLA promoted spike-field coherence and phase locking percentage, not only within the BLA but also between the BLA and the mPFC. Finally, direct chemogenetic activation of mPFC-projecting BLA neurons during fear conditioning enhanced cued fear memory. Taken together, our data suggest that astrocytes in the BLA may contribute to aversive learning by modulating amygdala–mPFC communication. MDPI 2022-05-29 /pmc/articles/PMC9181030/ /pubmed/35682767 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijms23116092 Text en © 2022 by the authors. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). |
spellingShingle | Article Lei, Zhuogui Xie, Li Li, Cheuk Hin Lam, Yuk Yan Ramkrishnan, Aruna Surendran Fu, Zhongqi Zeng, Xianlin Liu, Shu Iqbal, Zafar Li, Ying Chemogenetic Activation of Astrocytes in the Basolateral Amygdala Contributes to Fear Memory Formation by Modulating the Amygdala–Prefrontal Cortex Communication |
title | Chemogenetic Activation of Astrocytes in the Basolateral Amygdala Contributes to Fear Memory Formation by Modulating the Amygdala–Prefrontal Cortex Communication |
title_full | Chemogenetic Activation of Astrocytes in the Basolateral Amygdala Contributes to Fear Memory Formation by Modulating the Amygdala–Prefrontal Cortex Communication |
title_fullStr | Chemogenetic Activation of Astrocytes in the Basolateral Amygdala Contributes to Fear Memory Formation by Modulating the Amygdala–Prefrontal Cortex Communication |
title_full_unstemmed | Chemogenetic Activation of Astrocytes in the Basolateral Amygdala Contributes to Fear Memory Formation by Modulating the Amygdala–Prefrontal Cortex Communication |
title_short | Chemogenetic Activation of Astrocytes in the Basolateral Amygdala Contributes to Fear Memory Formation by Modulating the Amygdala–Prefrontal Cortex Communication |
title_sort | chemogenetic activation of astrocytes in the basolateral amygdala contributes to fear memory formation by modulating the amygdala–prefrontal cortex communication |
topic | Article |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9181030/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35682767 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijms23116092 |
work_keys_str_mv | AT leizhuogui chemogeneticactivationofastrocytesinthebasolateralamygdalacontributestofearmemoryformationbymodulatingtheamygdalaprefrontalcortexcommunication AT xieli chemogeneticactivationofastrocytesinthebasolateralamygdalacontributestofearmemoryformationbymodulatingtheamygdalaprefrontalcortexcommunication AT licheukhin chemogeneticactivationofastrocytesinthebasolateralamygdalacontributestofearmemoryformationbymodulatingtheamygdalaprefrontalcortexcommunication AT lamyukyan chemogeneticactivationofastrocytesinthebasolateralamygdalacontributestofearmemoryformationbymodulatingtheamygdalaprefrontalcortexcommunication AT ramkrishnanarunasurendran chemogeneticactivationofastrocytesinthebasolateralamygdalacontributestofearmemoryformationbymodulatingtheamygdalaprefrontalcortexcommunication AT fuzhongqi chemogeneticactivationofastrocytesinthebasolateralamygdalacontributestofearmemoryformationbymodulatingtheamygdalaprefrontalcortexcommunication AT zengxianlin chemogeneticactivationofastrocytesinthebasolateralamygdalacontributestofearmemoryformationbymodulatingtheamygdalaprefrontalcortexcommunication AT liushu chemogeneticactivationofastrocytesinthebasolateralamygdalacontributestofearmemoryformationbymodulatingtheamygdalaprefrontalcortexcommunication AT iqbalzafar chemogeneticactivationofastrocytesinthebasolateralamygdalacontributestofearmemoryformationbymodulatingtheamygdalaprefrontalcortexcommunication AT liying chemogeneticactivationofastrocytesinthebasolateralamygdalacontributestofearmemoryformationbymodulatingtheamygdalaprefrontalcortexcommunication |