V-101 | The role of ventral tegmental area to amygdala circuit in learning and memory

Neural Circuits and Systems Neuroscience
Author: Camila Maria Polotto | Email: camila.polotto@gmail.com

Camila Polotto^1°2°, Bárbara Giugovaz Tropper^1°2°, Lucía Garbini^1°2°, Estefanía Bello^1°2°, Mariano Belluscio^1°2°

^1° Universidad de Buenos Aires, Facultad de Ciencias Médicas, Departamento de Ciencias Fisiológicas. Grupo de Neurociencia de Sistemas. Buenos Aires, Argentina.
^2° CONICET – Universidad de Buenos Aires. Instituto de Fisiología y Biofísica Bernardo Houssay (IFIBIO Houssay). Buenos Aires, Argentina.

Memory is a fundamental aspect of our life, allowing us to store information from past experiences. The use of these memories enables animals to obtain the maximum benefit from their actions, whether that be by avoiding danger or exploiting resources. Equally important is the ability to extinguish memories that are no longer useful. It has been extensively demonstrated that the amygdala (AMY), in particular its basolateral portion, has a fundamental role in associative aversive learning, not only at individual neuronal activity but also in coordination with other brain regions including prefrontal cortex and ventral tegmental area neurons. The activity of neurons in the ventral tegmental area (VTA) is known to be related to reward mediated learning and recent studies have also shown they have the ability to respond also to aversive events. However, specific target areas that could be mediating this effect remain poorly understood. In this study, we want to further explore the role of the VTA-AMY in learning and memory. Here, we present different behavioral paradigms that allow us to test the role of the VTA neurons projecting to the Amygdala in both appetitive and aversive learning.