Fig. 9
From: Divergent midbrain circuits orchestrate escape and freezing responses to looming stimuli in mice
Effects of selective increase of intrinsic excitability of PBGN neurons or LPTN neurons on visually triggered dimorphic defensive behaviors. a, b AAV-DIO-EGFP-2A-NaChBac was locally injected into the bilateral PBGN (a) and LPTN (b) of vGlut2-ires-Cre mice, resulting in expression of EGFP in PBGN neurons (a, inset) and LPTN neurons (b, inset). Scale bars, 1.5 mm (a) and 2 mm (b). c Schematic diagram showing whole-cell recording of EGFP+ PBGN or LPTN neurons in acute slices. d, e Example traces (d) and quantitative analyses (e) of depolarization-induced spiking activity from EGFP+ PBGN neurons infected by AAV-DIO-EGFP (Ctrl) or AAV-DIO-EGFP-2A-NaChBac (NaChBac). f, g Example traces (f) and quantitative analyses (g) of depolarization-induced spiking activity from EGFP+ LPTN neurons infected by AAV-DIO-EGFP (Ctrl) or AAV-DIO-EGFP-2A-NaChBac (NaChBac). h, k Distribution of locomotion speed during vs. before (left) and after vs. before (right) looming visual stimuli of mice with (NaChBac) or without (Ctrl) increased excitability of PBGN neurons (h) and LPTN neurons (k). i, l Distribution of LSIduring stimuli and LSIafter stimuli of mice with (NaChBac) or without (Ctrl) selective increase of excitability in PBGN neurons (i) and LPTN neurons (l). j, m Quantitative analyses of the effects of increased excitability of PBGN neurons (j) or LPTN neurons (m) on the percentage of mice with Type I and Type II defensive behavioral patterns. Data in (e, g) are means ± SEM (error bars). Numbers of cells are indicated in the graphs. Statistical analysis was one-way ANOVA (***P < 0.001)
