Publication Date:
2013-09-28
Description:
Drug-evoked synaptic plasticity in the mesolimbic system reshapes circuit function and drives drug-adaptive behavior. Much research has focused on excitatory transmission in the ventral tegmental area (VTA) and the nucleus accumbens (NAc). How drug-evoked synaptic plasticity of inhibitory transmission affects circuit adaptations remains unknown. We found that medium spiny neurons expressing dopamine (DA) receptor type 1 (D1R-MSNs) of the NAc project to the VTA, strongly preferring the GABA neurons of the VTA. Repeated in vivo exposure to cocaine evoked synaptic potentiation at this synapse, occluding homosynaptic inhibitory long-term potentiation. The activity of the VTA GABA neurons was thus reduced and DA neurons were disinhibited. Cocaine-evoked potentiation of GABA release from D1R-MSNs affected drug-adaptive behavior, which identifies these neurons as a promising target for novel addiction treatments.〈br /〉〈span class="detail_caption"〉Notes: 〈/span〉Bocklisch, Christina -- Pascoli, Vincent -- Wong, Jovi C Y -- House, David R C -- Yvon, Cedric -- de Roo, Mathias -- Tan, Kelly R -- Luscher, Christian -- New York, N.Y. -- Science. 2013 Sep 27;341(6153):1521-5. doi: 10.1126/science.1237059.〈br /〉〈span class="detail_caption"〉Author address: 〈/span〉Department of Basic Neurosciences, Medical Faculty, University of Geneva, CH-1211 Geneva, Switzerland.〈br /〉〈span class="detail_caption"〉Record origin:〈/span〉 〈a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24072923" target="_blank"〉PubMed〈/a〉
Keywords:
Animals
;
Cocaine/*pharmacology
;
Cocaine-Related Disorders/physiopathology
;
Dopaminergic Neurons/*metabolism
;
Mice
;
Mice, Inbred C57BL
;
Mice, Transgenic
;
Neuronal Plasticity/drug effects
;
Synaptic Transmission/drug effects/physiology
;
Ventral Tegmental Area/*metabolism
;
gamma-Aminobutyric Acid/*drug effects/metabolism
Print ISSN:
0036-8075
Electronic ISSN:
1095-9203
Topics:
Biology
,
Chemistry and Pharmacology
,
Computer Science
,
Medicine
,
Natural Sciences in General
,
Physics
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