How the brain initiates, maintains and coordinates motivated behaviors is largely unknown. Multiple neuronal circuits are crucial for the coordinated regulation of reward and aversion, thus changing motivation and action. Our speakers will present their latest results on functions of four complementary neuronal circuits regulating motivated behaviors. They will further describe how combination of tools including optogenetics, calcium imaging and in vivo and in vitro electrophysiology allows them to study these circuits in health and pathology. Stephan Lammel will present his work on the mesocorticolimbic dopamine (DA) system, crucial in reward processing and motivated behavior. Recent research in his lab showed that ventral tegmental area (VTA) DA neurons encode much more than reward and also contribute to aversive behaviors. Nadine Gogolla will describe representations of bodily and emotional states in the insular cortex which strongly affect the responsiveness to sensory cues and gate motivated behaviors ranging from feeding to social and emotional behaviors. The insular cortex integrates external sensory cues with internal affective and bodily states to predict future outcomes, and acts as an important top-down regulator of ongoing behaviors. Manuel Mameli will discuss the role of the epithalamic circuit and its aberrant function underlying stress-mediated cognitive impairment, and the synaptic adaptations underlying them. Tatiana Korotkova will present her recent work on complementary regulation of multiple motivated behaviors including feeding and social behaviors, by lateral septal circuits. Altogether, the proposed symposium will highlight functional organization of motivated behavior-regulating neuronal circuits and thus gain insights into neural basis of complementary motivated behaviors crucial for survival.
Our work is funded by the European Research Council (ERC-2017-STG, grant agreement 758448, NG; ERC-2017-CTG HypFeedNet, TK), the DFG (ANR-17-CE37-0021, ‘SAFENET’, NG; 431549029 – SFB 1451, TK; 233886668/GRK1960, TK) and Max Planck Society (Max Planck Research Group, NG and TK).

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