Effects of chronic ethanol exposure on dorsal medial striatal neurons receiving convergent inputs from the orbitofrontal cortex and basolateral amygdala.

Alcohol use disorder is associated with altered function of cortical-amygdala-striatal circuits such as the orbitofrontal cortex (OFC), basolateral amygdala (BLA) and their connections to the dorsal medial striatum (DMS) shown to be involved in goal-directed actions. Using retrobead tracing, we previously reported enhanced excitability of DMS-projecting OFC neurons in mice following 3-to-7-day withdrawal from chronic intermittent ethanol (CIE) exposure. In the same animals, spiking of DMS-projecting BLA neurons was decreased at 3-days post-withdrawal followed by an increase in firing at 7- and 14-days. In the current study, we used transsynaptic labeling and slice electrophysiology to investigate the effects of CIE exposure on DMS neurons that receive convergent inputs from the OFC and BLA. Mice were infused with anterograde transsynaptic AAVs in the OFC (AAV1-Cre) and BLA (AAV1-Flpo) and a Cre-On/Flp-On-YFP AAV in the DMS followed by 4 weekly cycles of Air or CIE vapor exposure. Current-clamp recordings of YFP+ DMS neurons showed three distinct patterns of firing: regular spiking, regular spiking followed by depolarization block and regular spiking with the appearance of broadened action potentials and plateau potentials at higher current steps (termed FANS). In both male and female mice, withdrawal from CIE exposure significantly increased the excitability of regular spiking neurons as compared to air controls. More subtle effects were observed on FANS neurons with both increases and decreases in firing that were current step and sex-dependent. These findings add to a growing literature demonstrating how neurons within cortical-amygdala-striatal circuits implicated in compulsive/habitual behaviors are impacted by chronic alcohol exposure.