Comparing ABA, AAB, and ABC Renewal of Appetitive Pavlovian Conditioned Responding in Alcohol- and Sucrose-Trained Male Rats.

Conditioned responding can be renewed by re-exposure to the conditioning context following extinction in a different context (ABA renewal) or by removal from the extinction context (AAB or ABC renewal). ABA renewal is robust in Pavlovian and operant conditioning paradigms. However, fewer studies have investigated AAB and ABC renewal of appetitive conditioning, and those that did predominantly used operant conditioning tasks.

The medial prefrontal cortex is required for responding to alcohol-predictive cues but only in the absence of alcohol delivery.

Background: The prelimbic medial prefrontal cortex is implicated in promoting drug-seeking in relapse tests. However, drug-seeking behaviour is typically extinguished before a test and tests normally occur without drug delivery.

Aims: We investigated the involvement of the prelimbic and the infralimbic cortex in responding elicited by a non-extinguished cue for alcohol that was presented without alcohol in an alcohol-associated context or a neutral context, and in responding to the same cue when it was paired with alcohol.

Alcohol-Seeking Triggered by Discrete Pavlovian Cues is Invigorated by Alcohol Contexts and Mediated by Glutamate Signaling in the Basolateral Amygdala.

The environmental context in which a discrete Pavlovian conditioned stimulus (CS) is experienced can profoundly impact conditioned responding elicited by the CS. We hypothesized that alcohol-seeking behavior elicited by a discrete CS that predicted alcohol would be influenced by context and require glutamate signaling in the basolateral amygdala (BLA). Male, Long-Evans rats were allowed to drink 15% ethanol (v/v) until consumption stabilized.

Blocking dopamine d1-like receptors attenuates context-induced renewal of pavlovian-conditioned alcohol-seeking in rats.

Background: Environmental contexts associated with drug use can trigger craving in humans and the renewal of drug-seeking behaviors in animals. Here, we tested the hypothesis that context-induced renewal of Pavlovian-conditioned alcohol-seeking is mediated by dopamine.

Methods: Male, Long-Evans rats were trained to discriminate between two, 10-second, auditory conditioned stimuli.

Vendor differences in alcohol consumption and the contribution of dopamine receptors to Pavlovian-conditioned alcohol-seeking in Long-Evans rats.

Rationale: Drug-associated environmental stimuli elicit craving in humans and drug-seeking in animals.

Objectives: We tested the hypothesis that Pavlovian-conditioned alcohol-seeking is mediated by dopamine, using rats from two vendors.

Methods: Male, Long-Evans rats (220-240 g) from Charles River (St-Constant, QC, Canada) and Harlan Laboratories (Indianapolis, IN, USA) received 21 sessions of intermittent, 24-h access to ethanol (15 %, v/v) and water in the home-cage.