Microcircuits underlying murine parental behavior

项目摘要/摘要 许多严重的精神障碍有相当大的疾病负担，如自闭症谱系障碍， 精神分裂症和严重抑郁障碍的特点是严重的社会障碍。目前， 对这些社会缺陷的起源以及有效的诊断和治疗选择知之甚少 都是缺乏的。先进的分子和基因技术使特定神经回路的发现 在可能的社会行为中，促进特定诊断学和新治疗方法的发展 到有社会缺陷的障碍。我们利用了新开发的分子、基因和系统- Level工具可以揭示特定的神经群体和回路如何参与父母的照顾，这是一种社会行为 对后代的生存和福祉至关重要的是根据动物的性别和 生理状态。雄性和雌性小鼠对婴儿表现出从属或激进化行为，这取决于 基于先前的社会经验。在最近的工作中，我们发现了下丘脑神经元的不同亚群 都参与了对男性和女性育儿行为的积极和消极调节。身份的鉴定 这些高粒度的单元格类型为我们提供了一个独特的切入点，以进一步剖析 不同神经元群体的分子、生物物理和活动动力学调控着父母的照顾。我们 建议在这里利用精确的细胞类型识别参与控制的神经元群体 反对婴儿中介的行为，并使用高分辨率分子(目标1)、神经生理学(目标2)和 系统级(目标3)方法，以剖析与婴儿导向的社会互动相关的整个回路 并探索这些回路是如何受动物的性别和生理状态调节的。

Project Summary/Abstract Many severe mental disorders with considerable disease burden such Autism Spectrum Disorders, Schizophrenia, and Major Depressive Disorder are characterized by profound social impairments. At present, there is little understanding of the origin of these social deficits, and efficient diagnosis and therapeutic options are lacking. Advanced molecular and genetic techniques make the discovery of specific neural circuits involved in social behavior possible, facilitating the development of diagnostics and novel therapeutic approaches specific to disorders with social deficits. We have taken advantage of newly developed molecular, genetic and systems- levels tools to uncover how specific neural populations and circuits involved in parental care, a social behavior essential for the survival and well-being of the offspring are regulated according to the animal sex and physiological status. Male and female mice show either affiliative or agonistic behavior toward infants depending on prior social experience. In recent work, we uncovered distinct subpopulations of hypothalamic neurons that are involved in the positive and negative regulation of male and female parenting behavior. The identification of these cell types with high granularity provides us with unique entry point to further dissect how changes in the molecular, biophysical and activity dynamics of distinct neuronal populations regulates parental care. We propose here to exploit the precise cell type identification of neuronal populations involved in the control of opposing infant-mediated behaviors and use high resolution molecular (Aim 1), neurophysiological (Aim 2) and systems-level (Aim 3) approaches to dissect the entire circuitry associated with infant-directed social interactions and to explore how these circuits are modulated by the animal’s sex and physiological state.