Previous studies have shown that stress can increase the response of mesolimbic dopaminergic neurons to acute administration of drugs of abuse included ethanol. In this study, we investigated the possible involvement of the mesocortical dopaminergic pathway in the development of ethanol abuse under stress conditions. To this aim we trained both socially isolated (SI) and group housed (GH) rats ...

Citation Augustinack Jean C., et al. "Direct visualization of the perforant pathway in the human brain with ex vivo diffusion tensor imaging." Front. Hum. Neurosci. 4:42. Article is made available in accordance with the publisher's policy and may be subject to US copyright law. Please refer to the publisher's site for terms of use. The MIT Faculty has made this article openly available. Please ...

A number of double-blind, randomized, controlled trials have confirmed the clinical efficacy of aripiprazole in bipolar disorder and schizophrenia. Aripiprazole is the prototype of the ‘third generation’ atypical antipsychotics, or dopamine-serotoninstabilizers and is characterized by a relatively low risk of inducing metabolic adverse effects, causing sedation and other side effects such as hy...

Drug addiction is a chronic relapsing disorder for which research has been dedicated to understand the various factors that contribute to development, loss of control, and persistence of compulsive addictive behaviors. In this review, we provide a broad overview of various theories of addiction, drugs of abuse, and the neurobiology involved across the addiction cycle. Specific focus is devoted ...

It has been shown that dopamine (DA) modulates memory 0elds of dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (PFC) neurons. The DAergic neurons which project to the PFC are localized in the midbrain. We here developed a computational model network which includes the PFC circuit and the mesencephalic DA unit to analyze the circuit property of the cortico-mesocortical system. In our computer simulation, the cor...

In vivo extracellular recording studies have traditionally shown that dopamine (DA) transiently inhibits prefrontal cortex (PFC) neurons, yet recent biophysical measurements in vitro indicate that DA enhances the evoked excitability of PFC neurons for prolonged periods. Moreover, although DA neurons apparently encode stimulus salience by transient alterations in firing, the temporal properties ...