Departments of Physiology, Tsurumi University School of Dental Medicine, Yokohama 230-8501, Japan.
Brain Res. 2012 Oct 22;1480:41-52. doi: 10.1016/j.brainres.2012.08.050. Epub 2012 Aug 31.
Neurons in the medial nucleus of the amygdala (MeA) play a key role in the innate maternal, reproductive, defensive, and social behaviors. However, it is unclear how activation of the vomeronasal system leads to the behavioral outputs that are associated with pheromones. Here, we characterized the electrophysiological and morphological properties of MeA neurons using whole-cell recordings in mice slice preparations. Biocytin labeling revealed that MeA neurons possessed bipolar to multipolar cell bodies and dendritic fields covering projection areas from the accessory olfactory bulb. In 70% of recorded MeA neurons, monosynaptic excitatory postsynaptic currents (EPSCs) were evoked from the accessory olfactory bulb afferent in which the α-amino-3-hydroxy-5-methyl-4-isoxazole propionate component was dominant and was rarely followed by the N-methyl-d-aspartic acid component. Norepinephrine increased the frequency of spontaneous inhibitory postsynaptic currents in some neurons, whereas α-methyl-5-hydroxytryptamine increased spontaneous EPSCs in other neurons. Morphologically and physiologically, heterogeneous MeA neurons appear likely to produce multiplex outputs of instinctive behaviors.
杏仁中央核（MeA）中的神经元在先天的母性、生殖、防御和社交行为中起着关键作用。然而，目前尚不清楚嗅球系统的激活如何导致与信息素相关的行为输出。在这里，我们使用小鼠切片制备中的全细胞膜片钳记录来描述 MeA 神经元的电生理和形态特性。生物胞素标记表明，MeA 神经元具有双极到多极的胞体和树突场，覆盖了从副嗅球投射的区域。在记录到的 MeA 神经元中，70%的神经元可从副嗅球传入中诱发单突触兴奋性突触后电流（EPSC），其中α-氨基-3-羟基-5-甲基-4-异恶唑丙酸成分占主导地位，很少有 N-甲基-D-天冬氨酸成分。去甲肾上腺素增加了一些神经元中自发性抑制性突触后电流的频率，而α-甲基-5-羟色胺增加了其他神经元中自发性 EPSC 的频率。形态学和生理学上，异质的 MeA 神经元似乎有可能产生本能行为的多重输出。
