Intra-BLA alteration of interneurons' modulation of activity in rats, reveals a dissociation between effects on anxiety symptoms and extinction learning.

The basolateral amygdala (BLA) is a dynamic brain region involved in emotional experiences and subject to long-term plasticity. The BLA also modulates activity, plasticity, and related behaviors associated with other brain regions, including the mPFC and hippocampus. Accordingly, intra-BLA plasticity can be expected to alter both BLA-dependent behaviors and behaviors mediated by other brain regions.

Selective knockdown of GABAA-α2 subunit in the dorsal dentate gyrus in adulthood induces anxiety, learning and memory deficits and impairs synaptic plasticity.

Animal studies and clinical trials suggest that maintenance of gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA)-ergic activity may be crucial in coping with stressful conditions, anxiety and mood disorders. Drugs highly efficient in promoting anxiolysis were shown to activate this system, particularly via the α2-subunit of type A receptors (GABAA α2). Given the high expression of GABAA α2 in the dentate gyrus (DG) sub-field of the hippocampus, we sought to examine whether manipulation of the α2 subunit in this area will evoke changes in emotional behaviour, memory and learning as well as in synaptic plasticity.

The role of hippocampal CaMKII in resilience to trauma-related psychopathology.

Traumatic stress exposure can form persistent trauma-related memories. However, only a minority of individuals develop post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptoms upon exposure. We employed a rat model of PTSD, which enables differentiating between exposed-affected and exposed-unaffected individuals.

Reducing glutamic acid decarboxylase in the dorsal dentate gyrus attenuates juvenile stress induced emotional and cognitive deficits.

A high degree of regional, temporal and molecular specificity is evident in the regulation of GABAergic signaling in stress-responsive circuitry, hampering the use of systemic GABAergic modulators for the treatment of stress-related psychopathology. Here we investigated the effectiveness of local intervention with the GABA synthetic enzymes GAD65 and GAD67 in the dorsal dentate gyrus (dDG) ventral DG (vDG) to alleviate anxiety-like behavior and stress-induced symptoms in the rat. We induced shRNA-mediated knock down of either GAD65 or GAD67 with lentiviral vectors microinjected into the dDG or vDG of young adult male rats and examined anxiety behavior, learning and memory performance.