Bed nucleus of the stria terminalis regulates fear to unpredictable threat signals
Bed nucleus of the stria terminalis regulates fear to unpredictable threat signals
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DOI：
10.7554/elife.46525
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发表时间：
2019-04-04
期刊：
影响因子：
7.7
通讯作者：
Maren, Stephen
中科院分区：
文献类型：
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作者：
Goode, Travis D.;Ressler, Reed L.;Maren, Stephen
终纹床核（BNST）与条件性恐惧和焦虑有关，但导致 BNST 产生防御行为的具体因素尚不清楚。在这里，我们检查了 BNST 是否介导了条件刺激 (CS) 的冻结，而这种冻结很难预测大鼠厌恶性非条件刺激 (US) 的发生。 BNST 的可逆失活选择性地减少了对 US 起始信号较差的 CS 的冻结（例如，跟随 US 的向后 CS），但并没有消除对向前 CS 的冻结，即使它们预测了不同强度的 US。此外，向后（但不是向前）的CS选择性地增加腹侧BNST和内侧前额叶皮层（mPFC）边缘下区域的BNST投射神经元中的Fos，但不增加海马或杏仁核中的Fos。这些数据表明，BNST 回路调节对不可预测威胁的恐惧，这可能对焦虑的病因和表达至关重要。
The bed nucleus of the stria terminalis (BNST) has been implicated in conditioned fear and anxiety, but the specific factors that engage the BNST in defensive behaviors are unclear. Here we examined whether the BNST mediates freezing to conditioned stimuli (CSs) that poorly predict the onset of aversive unconditioned stimuli (USs) in rats. Reversible inactivation of the BNST selectively reduced freezing to CSs that poorly signaled US onset (e.g., a backward CS that followed the US), but did not eliminate freezing to forward CSs even when they predicted USs of variable intensity. Additionally, backward (but not forward) CSs selectively increased Fos in the ventral BNST and in BNST-projecting neurons in the infralimbic region of the medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC), but not in the hippocampus or amygdala. These data reveal that BNST circuits regulate fear to unpredictable threats, which may be critical to the etiology and expression of anxiety.