Midbrain Archives - Inscopix, Inc.

Dopamine neuron activity encodes the length of upcoming contralateral movement sequences

Marcelo D. Mendonça et al.
Current Biology | February 19, 2024
Dopaminergic neurons (DANs) in the substantia nigra pars compacta (SNc) have been related to movement speed, and loss of these neurons leads to bradykinesia in Parkinson’s disease (PD). However, other aspects of...

Dopamine subsystems that track internal states

James C. R. Grove et al.
Nature | July 13, 2022
Food and water are rewarding in part because they satisfy our internal needs. Dopaminergic neurons in the ventral tegmental area (VTA) are activated by gustatory rewards, but how animals learn to associate these oral...

Single-cell activity and network properties of dorsal raphe nucleus serotonin neurons during emotionally salient behaviors

Grace E. Paquelet et al.
Neuron | June 13, 2022
The serotonin system modulates a wide variety of emotional behaviors and states, including reward processing, anxiety, and social interaction. To reveal the underlying patterns of neural activity, we visualized...

Targeted activation of midbrain neurons restores locomotor function in mouse models of parkinsonism

Débora Masini et al.
Nature Communications | January 26, 2022
The pedunculopontine nucleus (PPN) is a locomotor command area containing glutamatergic neurons that control locomotor initiation and maintenance. These motor actions are deficient in Parkinson’s disease (PD), where...

Transient dopamine neuron activity precedes and encodes the vigor of contralateral movements

Marcelo D Mendonça et al.
bioRxiv | April 20, 2021
Dopamine neurons (DANs) in the substantia nigra pars compacta (SNc) have been related to movement vigor, and loss of these neurons leads to bradykinesia in Parkinson’s disease. However, it remains unclear whether DANs...

Lateral VTA modulates conditioned learning

Giorgio Rizzi et al.
Cell Reports | March 16, 2021
lVTA Vgat and Vglut2 projections onto dmCINs influence aversive stimuli encoding

Lateral ventral tegmental area GABAergic and glutamatergic modulation of conditioned learning

Giorgio Rizzi et al.
Cell Reports | March 16, 2021
The firing activity of dorso-medial-striatal-cholinergic interneurons (dmCINs) is a neural correlate of classical conditioning. Tonically active, they pause in response to salient stimuli, mediating acquisition of...

Postingestive Modulation of Food Seeking Depends on Vagus-Mediated Dopamine Neuron Activity

Ana B. Fernandes et al.
Neuron | April 6, 2020
Postingestive nutrient sensing can induce food preferences. However, much less is known about the ability of postingestive signals to modulate food-seeking behaviors. Here we report a causal connection between...

Generality and opponency of rostromedial tegmental (RMTg) roles in valence processing

Hao Li et al.
eLife | January 22, 2020
The rostromedial tegmental nucleus (RMTg), a GABAergic afferent to midbrain dopamine (DA) neurons, has been hypothesized to be broadly activated by aversive stimuli. However, this encoding pattern has only been...

Control of Non-REM Sleep by Midbrain Neurotensinergic Neurons

Peng Zhong et al.
Neuron | September 30, 2019
The periaqueductal gray (PAG) in the midbrain is known to coordinate behavioral and autonomic responses to threat and injury through its descending projections to the brainstem. Here, we show that neurotensin...

GABA and glutamate neurons in the VTA regulate sleep and wakefulness

Xiao Yu et al.
Nature Neuroscience | December 17, 2018
We screened for novel circuits in the mouse brain that promote wakefulness. Chemogenetic activation experiments and electroencephalogram recordings pointed to glutamatergic/nitrergic (NOS1) and GABAergic neurons in the...

Dorsal tegmental dopamine neurons gate associative learning of fear

Florian Groessl et al.
Nature Neuroscience | June 27, 2018
Functional neuroanatomy of Pavlovian fear has identified neuronal circuits and synapses associating conditioned stimuli with aversive events. Hebbian plasticity within these networks requires additional reinforcement to...

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