FOR 1581: Extinction Learning: Behavioural, Neural and Clinical Mechanisms

我们可以学习新的信息，并随后能够记住它。然而，我们同样能够了解到，一旦获得信息就不再有效，并停止对其做出反应。虽然人们对获得新知识的最初过程进行了很好的研究，但对灭绝过程的了解要少得多。众所周知，灭绝涉及到一个新的学习过程，这个过程与最初获得CS-US-Association不同，也更复杂。熄灭的反应不会消失，但可以在诸如背景变化等操作之后恢复，就像在更新范式中一样。在我们研究单位的范围内，我们计划探索包括人类在内的各种物种灭绝的神经、行为和临床机制。我们在系统和技术层面的方法的多样性将与概念、实验、结构和技术层面的高度统一结合在一起：在实验设计层面，研究股内的所有参与者都将在其实验中使用更新方法。这将使我们能够研究上下文线索的作用，并通过一个单一的程序分析从啮齿动物到人类的灭绝学习的共同特征。在结构层面上，所有神经生物学和大多数临床小组将至少集中在前额叶皮质、海马体和杏仁核实验的一部分，因为之前的研究已经确定这些区域对消失性学习至关重要。所有对人类受试者的研究都将在至少一部分实验中采用类似的预测性学习任务。在神经化学层面，我们计划在几个项目中研究灭绝学习过程中重叠的递质系统和受体系统。使用这一策略，我们打算对不同系统和有机体中灭绝学习的共同和独特机制进行深入的洞察。我们认为，这种方法是实现基础科学和临床科学之间相互转化的最有前途的方法。

We can learn new information and are subsequently able to remember it. However, we are equally able to learn that once acquired information is no longer valid and cease to respond to it. While the initial process of acquisition of new knowledge is well studied, the process of extinction is far less understood. Extinction is known to involve a new learning process that is different and more complex than the initial acquisition of the CS-US-association. Extinguished responses do not disappear but can return following manipulations such as a change in context as in renewal paradigms. Within the scope of our Research Unit, we plan to explore the neural, the behavioural and the clinical mechanisms of extinction in various species, including humans. The diversity of our approaches at the systems and at the technical level will be combined with a high level of uniformity at conceptual, experimental, structural and technical levels: At the experimental design level, all participants within the Research Unit will utilise the renewal approach in their experiments. This will enable us to study the role of contextual cues and to analyse the common signatures of extinction learning from rodents to men with a single procedure. At the structural level, all neurobiological and most clinical groups will concentrate in at least a part of their experiments on the prefrontal cortex, the hippocampus and the amygdala, since previous studies had identified these areas to be critical for extinction learning. All studies with human subjects will employ comparable predictive learning tasks in at least a part of their experiments. At the neurochemical level, we plan to study overlapping transmitter- und receptor-systems during extinction learning in several projects. Using this strategy, we intend to harvest deep insights into both the common and the distinct mechanisms of extinction learning in different systems and organisms. We believe that such an approach is the most promising one to achieve translational insights between basic and clinical science.