Activation of the dopaminergic pathway from VTA to the medial olfactory tubercle generates odor-preference and reward
- Wuhan Institute of Physics and Mathematics, China
- Wuhan University, China
- Shenzhen Institutes of Advanced Technology, China
- Wuhan National Laboratory for Optoelectronics, China
Abstract
Odor-preferences are usually influenced by life experiences. However, the neural circuit mechanisms remain unclear. The medial olfactory tubercle (mOT) is involved in both reward and olfaction, while the ventral tegmental area (VTA) dopaminergic (DAergic) neurons are considered to be engaged in reward and motivation. Here, we found that the VTA (DAergic)-mOT pathway could be activated by different types of naturalistic rewards as well as odors in DAT-cre mice. Optogenetic activation of the VTA-mOT DAergic fibers was able to elicit preferences for space, location and neutral odor, while pharmacological blockade of the dopamine receptors in the mOT fully prevented the odor-preference formation. Furthermore, inactivation of the mOT-projecting VTA DAergic neurons eliminated the previously formed odor-preference and strongly affected the Go-no go learning efficiency. In summary, our results revealed that the VTA (DAergic)-mOT pathway mediates a variety of naturalistic reward processes and different types of preferences including odor-preference in mice.
Article and author information
Author details
Funding
Ministry of Science and Technology of the People's Republic of China (2015CB755600)
- Fuqiang Xu
Chinese Academy of Sciences (XDB02050005)
- Fuqiang Xu
National Natural Science Foundation of China (81661148053)
- Fuqiang Xu
National Natural Science Foundation of China (91632303)
- Fuqiang Xu
National Natural Science Foundation of China (31400945)
- Qing Liu
National Natural Science Foundation of China (31400946)
- Xiaoping Rao
National Natural Science Foundation of China (31400977)
- Xiaobin He
The funders had no role in study design, data collection and interpretation, or the decision to submit the work for publication.
Reviewing Editor
- Rui M Costa, Columbia University in the City of New York, United States
Ethics
Animal experimentation: All surgical and experimental procedures were conducted in accordance with the guidelines of the Animal Care and Use Committee at the Wuhan Institute of Physics and Mathematics, the Chinese Academy of Sciences (reference number: WIPM-(2014)39). All Animals were housed with their littermates in a dedicated housing room with a 12/12 h light/dark cycle. Food and water were available free unless specifically noted. During the surgery, every effort was made to minimize suffering.
Version history
- Received: January 24, 2017
- Accepted: December 15, 2017
- Accepted Manuscript published: December 18, 2017 (version 1)
- Version of Record published: January 22, 2018 (version 2)
Copyright
© 2017, Zhang et al.
This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License permitting unrestricted use and redistribution provided that the original author and source are credited.
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Activation of the dopaminergic pathway from VTA to the medial olfactory tubercle generates odor-preference and reward
eLife 6:e25423.
https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.25423
Further reading
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Probing memory of a complex visual image within a few hundred milliseconds after its disappearance reveals significantly greater fidelity of recall than if the probe is delayed by as little as a second. Classically interpreted, the former taps into a detailed but rapidly decaying visual sensory or ‘iconic’ memory (IM), while the latter relies on capacity-limited but comparatively stable visual working memory (VWM). While iconic decay and VWM capacity have been extensively studied independently, currently no single framework quantitatively accounts for the dynamics of memory fidelity over these time scales. Here, we extend a stationary neural population model of VWM with a temporal dimension, incorporating rapid sensory-driven accumulation of activity encoding each visual feature in memory, and a slower accumulation of internal error that causes memorized features to randomly drift over time. Instead of facilitating read-out from an independent sensory store, an early cue benefits recall by lifting the effective limit on VWM signal strength imposed when multiple items compete for representation, allowing memory for the cued item to be supplemented with information from the decaying sensory trace. Empirical measurements of human recall dynamics validate these predictions while excluding alternative model architectures. A key conclusion is that differences in capacity classically thought to distinguish IM and VWM are in fact contingent upon a single resource-limited WM store.
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- Neuroscience
Our ability to recall details from a remembered image depends on a single mechanism that is engaged from the very moment the image disappears from view.
