Search results for "Prefrontal"
showing 10 items of 329 documents
Making a mountain out of a molehill: on the role of the rostral dorsal anterior cingulate and dorsomedial prefrontal cortex in conscious threat appra…
2013
According to appraisal theories fear and anxiety are elicited by the subjective evaluation of a situation or internal state as threatening. From this perspective anxiety disorders result from maladaptive, exaggerated threat appraisals that over-estimate the threatening consequences of often innocuous stimuli and situations. When these threat over-estimations occur at the level of conscious processing, they are referred to as catastrophizing and worrying. Both are major pathogenic processes in many clinical theories of anxiety. Until recently, little has been known about the neurobiological basis of normal and pathological conscious threat appraisal. Here, we review functional neuroimaging s…
Neurons in the pigeon nidopallium caudolaterale signal the selection and execution of perceptual decisions
2014
Sensory systems provide organisms with information on the current status of the environment, thus enabling adaptive behavior. The neural mechanisms by which sensory information is exploited for action selection are typically studied with mammalian subjects performing perceptual decision-making tasks, and most of what is known about these mechanisms at the single-neuron level is derived from cortical recordings in behaving monkeys. To explore the generality of neural mechanisms underlying perceptual decision making across species, we recorded single-neuron activity in the pigeon nidopallium caudolaterale (NCL), a non-laminated associative forebrain structure thought to be functionally equiva…
Neuronal populations mediating the effects of endocannabinoids on stress and emotionality
2011
An adequate emotional response to stress is essential for survival and requires the fine-tuned regulation of several distinct neuronal circuits. Therefore, a precise control of these circuits is necessary to prevent behavioral imbalances. During the last decade, numerous investigations have evidenced that the endocannabinoid (eCB) system is able to crucially control stress coping. Its central component, the cannabinoid type 1 receptor (CB1 receptor), is located at the presynapse, where it is able to attenuate neurotransmitter release after its activation by postsynaptically produced and released eCBs. To date, the eCB system has been found to control the neurotransmitter release from severa…
Analysis of a spatial orientation memory in Drosophila.
2008
Flexible goal-driven orientation requires that the position of a target be stored, especially in case the target moves out of sight. The capability to retain, recall and integrate such positional information into guiding behaviour has been summarized under the term spatial working memory. This kind of memory contains specific details of the presence that are not necessarily part of a long-term memory. Neurophysiological studies in primates indicate that sustained activity of neurons encodes the sensory information even though the object is no longer present. Furthermore they suggest that dopamine transmits the respective input to the prefrontal cortex, and simultaneous suppression by GABA s…
Long term effects of peripubertal stress on excitatory and inhibitory circuits in the prefrontal cortex of male and female mice.
2021
Abstract The impact of stressful events is especially important during early life, because certain cortical regions, especially the prefrontal cortex (PFC), are still developing. Consequently, aversive experiences that occur during the peripubertal period can cause long-term alterations in neural connectivity, physiology and related behaviors. Although sex influences the stress response and women are more likely to develop stress-related psychiatric disorders, knowledge about the effects of stress on females is still limited. In order to analyze the long-term effects of peripubertal stress (PPS) on the excitatory and inhibitory circuitry of the adult PFC, and whether these effects are sex-d…
Ethanol intake in male mice exposed to social defeat: Environmental enrichment potentiates resilience
2021
Large preclinical evidence shows that exposure to social defeat (SD) increases vulnerability to drug abuse, increasing the consumption of ethanol. However, not all subjects are equally affected by the changes induced by stress. Previous reports have evidenced that the resilient phenotype to depressive-like behaviors after SD is associated with the resistant phenotype to cocaine-increased rewarding effects and the smaller neuroinflammatory response. The aim of the present study was to further clarify whether the resilient profile to depressive-like behavior also predicts a protection against the increase in ethanol intake induced by SD. The neuroinflammatory profile was studied after the end…
Functional Connectivity of Nucleus Accumbens and Medial Prefrontal Cortex With Other Brain Regions During Early-Abstinence Is Associated With Alcohol…
2021
Background: Alcohol dependence (AD) is a chronic recurrent brain disease that causes a heavy disease burden worldwide, partly due to high relapse rates after detoxification. Verified biomarkers are not available for AD and its relapse, although the nucleus accumbens (NAc) and medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) may play important roles in the mechanism of addiction. This study investigated AD- and relapse-associated functional connectivity (FC) of the NAc and mPFC with other brain regions during early abstinence.Methods: Sixty-eight hospitalized early-abstinence AD male patients and 68 age- and education-matched healthy controls (HCs) underwent resting-functional magnetic resonance imaging (r-f…
Bilateral Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation of the Prefrontal Cortex Reduces Cocaine Intake: A Pilot Study
2016
Background Chronic cocaine consumption is associated with a decrease in mesolimbic dopamine transmission that maintains drug intake. transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) is gaining reliability, a useful therapeutic tool in drug addiction, since it can modulate cortico-limbic activity resulting in reduction of drug craving. Aims In the present study, we investigated the therapeutic effect of bilateral TMS of prefrontal cortex (PFC) in reducing cocaine intake, in a sample of treatment-seeking patients with current cocaine use disorder (DSM-V). Methods Ten cocaine addicts (DSM-V) were randomly assigned to the active or sham stimulation protocol in a double-blind experimental design. Twelve …
Frequency-specific network activity predicts bradykinesia severity in Parkinson’s disease
2021
Highlights • Parallel subnetworks are affected in bradykinesia. • The primary motor and the premotor cortex are common nodes with task-specificity. • Beta activity decreases, gamma activity increases with improvement of bradykinesia. • Subthalamic stimulation reduces beta, increases gamma power in ipsilateral cortex. • Subnetworks act with frequency-specific oscillations.
Neural networks engaged in milliseconds and seconds time processing: evidence from transcranial magnetic stimulation and patients with cortical or su…
2009
Here, we review recent transcranial magnetic stimulation studies and investigations in patients with neurological disease such as Parkinson's disease and stroke, showing that the neural processing of time requires the activity of wide range-distributed brain networks. The neural activity of the cerebellum seems most crucial when subjects are required to quickly estimate the passage of brief intervals, and when time is computed in relation to precise salient events. Conversely, the circuits involving the striatum and the substantia nigra projecting to the prefrontal cortex (PFC) are mostly implicated in supra-second time intervals and when time is processed in conjunction with other cognitiv…