Zheng Qiang, Liu Yujing, Huang Yue, Cao Jiaming, Wang Xuanning, Yu Jianing
State Key Laboratory of Membrane Biology, School of Life Sciences, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China.
School of Life Sciences, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China.
J Neurosci. 2025 Apr 16;45(16):e1820242025. doi: 10.1523/JNEUROSCI.1820-24.2025.
The ability to wait before responding is crucial for many cognitive functions, including reaction time (RT) tasks, where one must resist premature actions before the stimulus and respond quickly once it is presented. However, the brain regions governing waiting remain unclear. Using localized excitotoxic lesions, we investigated the roles of the motor cortex (MO) and sensorimotor dorsolateral striatum (DLS) in male rats performing a conditioned lever-release task with variable delays. Neural activity in both MO and DLS showed similar firing patterns during waiting and responding periods. However, only bilateral DLS lesions caused a sustained increase in premature (anticipatory) responses, whereas bilateral MO lesions primarily prolonged RTs. In a self-timing version of the task, where rats held a lever for a fixed delay before releasing it, DLS lesions caused a leftward shift in response timing, leading to persistently greater premature responses. These waiting deficits were accompanied by reduced motor vigor, such as slower reward-orienting locomotion. Our findings underscore the critical role of the sensorimotor striatum in regulating waiting behavior in timing-related tasks.
在做出反应之前等待的能力对于许多认知功能至关重要，包括反应时间（RT）任务，在这类任务中，人们必须在刺激出现之前抑制过早的行动，并在刺激出现后迅速做出反应。然而，控制等待的大脑区域仍不清楚。我们使用局部兴奋性毒性损伤，研究了运动皮层（MO）和感觉运动背外侧纹状体（DLS）在执行具有可变延迟的条件性杠杆释放任务的雄性大鼠中的作用。在等待和反应期间，MO和DLS中的神经活动表现出相似的放电模式。然而，只有双侧DLS损伤导致过早（预期）反应持续增加，而双侧MO损伤主要延长反应时间。在该任务的自定时版本中，大鼠在释放杠杆前保持固定延迟，DLS损伤导致反应时间向左偏移，导致持续更多的过早反应。这些等待缺陷伴随着运动活力的降低，例如奖励导向运动变慢。我们的研究结果强调了感觉运动纹状体在调节与时间相关任务中的等待行为方面的关键作用。
