Encoding of Conditioned Fear in Central Amygdala Inhibitory Circuits

Overview

Journal Nature

Specialty Science

Date 2010 Nov 12

PMID 21068837

Citations 497

Authors

Stephane Ciocchi

Cyril Herry

Francois Grenier

Steffen B E Wolff

Johannes J Letzkus

Ioannis Vlachos

Ingrid Ehrlich

Rolf Sprengel

Karl Deisseroth

Michael B Stadler

Christian Muller

Andreas Luthi

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

The central amygdala (CEA), a nucleus predominantly composed of GABAergic inhibitory neurons, is essential for fear conditioning. How the acquisition and expression of conditioned fear are encoded within CEA inhibitory circuits is not understood. Using in vivo electrophysiological, optogenetic and pharmacological approaches in mice, we show that neuronal activity in the lateral subdivision of the central amygdala (CEl) is required for fear acquisition, whereas conditioned fear responses are driven by output neurons in the medial subdivision (CEm). Functional circuit analysis revealed that inhibitory CEA microcircuits are highly organized and that cell-type-specific plasticity of phasic and tonic activity in the CEl to CEm pathway may gate fear expression and regulate fear generalization. Our results define the functional architecture of CEA microcircuits and their role in the acquisition and regulation of conditioned fear behaviour.

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