Neural Mechanisms of Individual Differences in Cocaine Avoidance

摘要： 可卡因等滥用药物产生的奖赏效应已得到广泛研究。然而，在这方面， 这些药物也会产生令人厌恶的效果，尽管它们强烈地影响着人们的健康， 药物寻求，并表现出较大的个体差异，导致个体成瘾的差异 倾向我们发现对可卡因的厌恶反应主要取决于血清素和谷氨酸 信号在嘴内侧被盖核（RMTg），一个主要的传入中脑多巴胺神经元。这 该提案研究了这些受体驱动神经激活和厌恶的细胞机制 条件反射，以及为什么这些反应在某些人身上比其他人更强烈， 总体目标是确定新的潜在治疗靶点，以调节药物寻求和治疗 成瘾

Abstract: Drugs of abuse, such as cocaine, produce rewarding effects that have been extensively investigated. However, these drugs also produce aversive effects that are far less understood, even though they strongly influence drug‐seeking, and exhibit large individual variability that contributes to differences in individual addiction propensity. We found that aversive responses to cocaine depend critically on serotonin and glutamate signaling in the rostromedial tegmental nucleus (RMTg), a major afferent to midbrain dopamine neurons. This proposal examines cellular mechanisms by which these receptors drive neural activation and aversive conditioning, and why these responses occur much more strongly in some individuals than others, with an overall aim of identifying novel potential therapeutic targets for regulating drug‐seeking and treating addiction.