| First Author | Koya E | Year | 2012 |
| Journal | Nat Neurosci | Volume | 15 |
| Issue | 11 | Pages | 1556-62 |
| PubMed ID | 23023294 | Mgi Jnum | J:285977 |
| Mgi Id | MGI:6214707 | Doi | 10.1038/nn.3232 |
| Citation | Koya E, et al. (2012) Silent synapses in selectively activated nucleus accumbens neurons following cocaine sensitization. Nat Neurosci 15(11):1556-62 |
| abstractText | Cocaine-induced alterations in synaptic glutamate function in nucleus accumbens are thought to mediate drug-related behaviors such as psychomotor sensitization. However, previous studies have examined global alterations in randomly selected accumbens neurons regardless of their activation state during cocaine-induced behavior. We recently found that a minority of strongly activated Fos-expressing accumbens neurons are necessary for cocaine-induced psychomotor sensitization, whereas the majority of accumbens neurons are less directly involved. We assessed synaptic alterations in these strongly activated accumbens neurons in Fos-GFP mice, which express a fusion protein of Fos and GFP in strongly activated neurons, and compared these alterations with those in surrounding non-activated neurons. Cocaine sensitization produced higher levels of ''silent synapses'', which contained functional NMDA receptors and nonfunctional AMPA receptors only in GFP-positive neurons, 6-11 d after sensitization. Thus, distinct synaptic alterations are induced in the most strongly activated accumbens neurons that mediate psychomotor sensitization. |
