Project description:To explore the specific subset of mPFC neurons involved in the pathophysiological process of CRS-induced depression, we performed RNAseq between noCRS and CRS treatment mice to identify the enriched genes and possible pathway. GO:BP analysis identified significantly enriched genes that are involved in synaptic signaling and regulation of membrane potential pathways.
Project description:Chronic pain is a major health care problem with great social and economic consequences. Although the medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) and the thalamus have been implicated in regulating pain, whether and how these regions may involve in pain chronification process have remained largely unknown. Here, we show that Foxp2+ neurons in mPFC, which are corticothalamic (CT) neurons representing the major mPFC output to thalamus, are deactivated in chronic inflammatory pain. Interestingly, prolonged, but not short-term, inactivation of the Foxp2+ neurons in mPFC increases the sensitivity to noxious stimulations. Conversely, chemogenetic activation of this neuronal cluster induces robust antinociceptive effects in both naïve mice and mice with chronic inflammatory pain. Furthermore, we found that the mPFC Foxp2+ neurons project to several thalamic relay nuclei and that activation of the mPFC to the parataenial nucleus of thalamus (PTN) circuit relieves pain. Finally, RNA-seq of the mPFC Foxp2+ neurons revealed that many genes related to neuronal activity are dysregulated in mice with chronic inflammatory pain. Collectively, our studies revealed that Foxp2+ neurons in mPFC that project to thalamus play a critical role in somatosensory processing and pain chronification.
Project description:Major depressive disorder (MDD) is considered as a neural circuit-based polygene syndrome that is mainly triggered by genetic susceptibility and stress factors. The present study employed the Wistar Kyoto (WKY) rat as an animal model with endogenous depression to further investigate the molecular basis of its genetic susceptibility to depression by performing quantitative protemoics analyses of the medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC), nucleus accumbens (NAc), and hippocampus (Hip), respectively.
Project description:We demonstrate in mice that perinatal SERT expression in glutamatergic pyramidal neurons in the hippocampus and mPFC modulates sexually dimorphic gene expression during hippocampal circuit assembly and is a source for sex-biased susceptibilities to cognitive and behavioral impairments.
Project description:Projection-dependent ribosome profling from mouse mPFC. Ribosome from NAC- and VTA- projecting mPFC cells were immunoprecipited using GFP-trap (Chromotech). Translating mRNA was isolated and analyzed
Project description:It is known that the eCB 2-AG is synthesized in postsynaptic cells and released into synaptic clefts when needed. As we observed that acute stress prominently increased eCBs in vmPFC-BLA synapses and that inhibited expression of 2-AG synthase gene Dagla in vmPFC-BLA synapses blocked stress-induced PGCID, we plausibly hypothesized that transient GCI increased 2-AG biosynthesis in BLA neurons, leading to stress-induced increase of 2-AG release into vmPFC-BLA synapses. To test this hypothesis, we employed single-cell sequencing to examine whether GCI mice, in comparison with sham mice, showed increased mRNA expression of the Dagla in c-fos positive BLA and vmPFC cells of acute stress-treated mice
Project description:In order to identify specific transcripts that might be necessary for CTA learning within the BLA, we used cell type-specific RNA-seq to profile transcriptional changes in sorted BLA projection neurons 4 hours following training.