Institute of Brain and Behavioral Sciences, College of Life Sciences, Shaanxi Normal University, Xi'an, China.
College of Life Sciences, Nanyang Normal University, Nanyang, China.
Elife. 2021 Jun 3;10:e67638. doi: 10.7554/eLife.67638.
Consolation is a common response to the distress of others in humans and some social animals, but the neural mechanisms underlying this behavior are not well characterized. By using socially monogamous mandarin voles, we found that optogenetic or chemogenetic inhibition of 5-HTergic neurons in the dorsal raphe nucleus (DR) or optogenetic inhibition of serotonin (5-HT) terminals in the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) significantly decreased allogrooming time in the consolation test and reduced sociability in the three-chamber test. The release of 5-HT within the ACC and the activity of DR neurons were significantly increased during allogrooming, sniffing, and social approaching. Finally, we found that the activation of 5-HT1A receptors in the ACC was sufficient to reverse consolation and sociability deficits induced by the chemogenetic inhibition of 5-HTergic neurons in the DR. Our study provided the first direct evidence that DR-ACC 5-HTergic neural circuit is implicated in consolation-like behaviors and sociability.
安慰是人类和一些社会性动物对他人痛苦的常见反应，但这种行为的神经机制尚不清楚。通过使用社交性一夫一妻制的布氏田鼠，我们发现光遗传学或化学遗传学抑制中缝背核（DR）的 5-羟色胺能神经元或前扣带皮层（ACC）的 5-羟色胺能末梢会显著减少安慰测试中的相互梳理时间，并降低三箱测试中的社交能力。在相互梳理、嗅探和社交接近过程中，ACC 内的 5-HT 释放和 DR 神经元的活动显著增加。最后，我们发现 ACC 中的 5-HT1A 受体的激活足以逆转由 DR 中 5-羟色胺能神经元的化学遗传学抑制引起的安慰和社交能力缺陷。我们的研究首次直接证明，DR-ACC 5-羟色胺能神经回路与类似安慰的行为和社交能力有关。
