A possible neural mechanism for photosensitivity in chronic pain.

Patients with functional pain disorders often complain of generalized sensory hypersensitivity, finding sounds, smells, or even everyday light aversive. The neural basis for this aversion is unknown, but it cannot be attributed to a general increase in cortical sensory processing. Here, we quantified the threshold for aversion to light in patients with fibromyalgia, a pain disorder thought to reflect dysregulation of pain-modulating systems in the brain.

Striatal cholinergic interneurons Drive GABA release from dopamine terminals.

Striatal cholinergic interneurons are implicated in motor control, associative plasticity, and reward-dependent learning. Synchronous activation of cholinergic interneurons triggers large inhibitory synaptic currents in dorsal striatal projection neurons, providing one potential substrate for control of striatal output, but the mechanism for these GABAergic currents is not fully understood. Using optogenetics and whole-cell recordings in brain slices, we find that a large component of these inhibitory responses derive from action-potential-independent disynaptic neurotransmission mediated by nicotinic receptors.

Control of basal ganglia output by direct and indirect pathway projection neurons.

The direct and indirect efferent pathways from striatum ultimately reconverge to influence basal ganglia output nuclei, which in turn regulate behavior via thalamocortical and brainstem motor circuits. However, the distinct contributions of these two efferent pathways in shaping basal ganglia output are not well understood. We investigated these processes using selective optogenetic control of the direct and indirect pathways, in combination with single-unit recording in the basal ganglia output nucleus substantia nigra pars reticulata (SNr) in mice.

Type 1 equilibrative nucleoside transporter regulates ethanol drinking through accumbal N-methyl-D-aspartate receptor signaling.

Background: Mice lacking type 1 equilibrative nucleoside transporter (ENT1(-/-)) exhibit increased ethanol-preferring behavior compared with wild-type littermates. This phenotype of ENT1(-/-) mice appears to be correlated with increased glutamate levels in the nucleus accumbens (NAc). However, little is known about the downstream consequences of increased glutamate signaling in the NAc.