Ventral striatal islands of Calleja neurons bidirectionally mediate depression-like behaviors in mice

Yun-Feng Zhang (), Jialiang Wu, Yingqi Wang, Natalie L. Johnson, Janardhan P. Bhattarai, Guanqing Li, Wenqiang Wang, Camilo Guevara, Hannah Shoenhard, Marc V. Fuccillo, Daniel W. Wesson and Minghong Ma ()
Additional contact information
Yun-Feng Zhang: Chinese Academy of Sciences
Jialiang Wu: Chinese Academy of Sciences
Yingqi Wang: University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine
Natalie L. Johnson: University of Florida
Janardhan P. Bhattarai: University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine
Guanqing Li: Chinese Academy of Sciences
Wenqiang Wang: Chinese Academy of Sciences
Camilo Guevara: University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine
Hannah Shoenhard: University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine
Marc V. Fuccillo: University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine
Daniel W. Wesson: University of Florida
Minghong Ma: University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine

Nature Communications, 2023, vol. 14, issue 1, 1-17

Abstract: Abstract The ventral striatum is a reward center implicated in the pathophysiology of depression. It contains islands of Calleja, clusters of dopamine D3 receptor-expressing granule cells, predominantly in the olfactory tubercle (OT). These OT D3 neurons regulate self-grooming, a repetitive behavior manifested in affective disorders. Here we show that chronic restraint stress (CRS) induces robust depression-like behaviors in mice and decreases excitability of OT D3 neurons. Ablation or inhibition of these neurons leads to depression-like behaviors, whereas their activation ameliorates CRS-induced depression-like behaviors. Moreover, activation of OT D3 neurons has a rewarding effect, which diminishes when grooming is blocked. Finally, we propose a model that explains how OT D3 neurons may influence dopamine release via synaptic connections with OT spiny projection neurons (SPNs) that project to midbrain dopamine neurons. Our study reveals a crucial role of OT D3 neurons in bidirectionally mediating depression-like behaviors, suggesting a potential therapeutic target.

Date: 2023
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-023-42662-z Abstract (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:nat:natcom:v:14:y:2023:i:1:d:10.1038_s41467-023-42662-z

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.nature.com/ncomms/

DOI: 10.1038/s41467-023-42662-z

Access Statistics for this article

Nature Communications is currently edited by Nathalie Le Bot, Enda Bergin and Fiona Gillespie

More articles in Nature Communications from Nature
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().