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Fear

Flipping the switch

Nature Reviews Neuroscience volume 9, page 581 (2008)Cite this article

In fear-conditioning paradigms, animals learn to associate a stimulus with an aversive footshock in a particular environment. If the animal is subsequently exposed to the conditioned stimulus without the footshock and in a different context the fear is eventually extinguished, but it can be refreshed if the stimulus is again presented in the conditioning context.

Lüthi and colleagues investigated, in mice, at which stages of fear learning and extinction the basal amygdala (BA) is involved. They showed that inactivating BA neurons with the GABAA (γ-aminobutyric acid type A) receptor agonist muscimol before extinction training prevented the reduction in freezing that is normally associated with extinction, whereas muscimol injections before fear-renewal training prevented the expected increase in freezing. These findings indicated that the BA might mediate the switch in freezing behaviour during fear extinction and renewal.

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ORIGINAL RESEARCH PAPERS

  1. Herry, C. et al. Switching on and off fear by distinct neuronal circuits. Nature 9 Jul 2008 (doi: 10.1038/nature07166)

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  2. Likhtik, E. et al. Amygdala intercalated neurons are required for expression of fear extinction. Nature 9 Jul 2008 (doi: 10.1038/nature07167)

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

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Authors
  1. Leonie Welberg
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Welberg, L. Flipping the switch. Nat Rev Neurosci 9, 581 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1038/nrn2468

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/nrn2468

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