Frontal Striatal Systems and Dopamine in Normal and Pathological Behavior

我们的实验室结合了神经生理学、药理学和影像学来了解由杏仁核、纹状体、前额皮质和多巴胺组成的一组大脑区域是如何成为学习的基础的。我们专门研究学习的过程，以预测选择是否会导致好的或坏的结果。我们与临床合作者密切合作，在显示出患者和对照组之间差异的动物身上实施任务，并从动物工作中获得发现，以帮助了解临床人群。当我们更好地理解这些大脑系统如何支持学习时，我们就能更好地理解这些系统中的病理是如何成为各种精神疾病的基础的，包括焦虑、抑郁和成瘾。我们最近的工作重点是扩大我们对这些学习过程中重要区域网络的理解。目前关于这种学习背后的电路的概念集中在多巴胺和腹侧纹状体上，而我们最近的工作也指出了杏仁核的重要作用。正在进行的研究包括，不同的神经系统是否决定了从积极和消极的结果（奖励和惩罚）中学习，重叠或不同的神经系统是否决定了有益的学习行为和学习选择有益的对象，以及探索不熟悉的选择选项和利用已知有益的先前经验选项之间的权衡。我们最近也开始研究越来越复杂的学习机制，并发现前额叶皮层代表了利用环境中上下文规律的学习过程。

Our lab uses a combination of neurophysiology, pharmacology and imaging to understand how a set of brain areas composed of the amygdala, striatum, prefrontal cortex and dopamine underlie learning. We specifically study the process of learning to predict whether choices will lead to good or bad outcomes. We work closely with clinical collaborators, implementing tasks in animals that have shown differences between patients and controls, and taking findings from the animal work to help understand clinical populations. As we develop a better understanding of how these brain systems support learning, we can develop a better understanding of how pathology in these systems can underlie various psychiatric disorders including anxiety, depression and addiction. Our recent work has focused on broadening our understanding of the network of areas important for these learning processes. Current conceptions of the circuitry that underlies this learning focuses on dopamine and the ventral-striatum, whereas our recent work also points to an important role for the amygdala. Ongoing work examines whether different neural systems underlie learning from positive vs. negative outcomes (rewards vs. punishments), whether overlapping or distinct neural systems underlie learning actions that are beneficial vs. learning to choose objects that are beneficial and the trade-off between exploring unfamiliar choice options, and exploiting previously experience options that are known to be rewarding. We have also recently begun to study increasingly sophisticated learning mechanisms and found that prefrontal cortex represents learning processes that take advantage of contextual regularities in the environment.