Cocaine-Induced Structural Plasticity in Input Regions to Distinct Cell Types in Nucleus Accumbens

The nucleus accumbens (NAc) is a brain region implicated in pathological motivated behaviors such as drug addiction and is composed predominantly of two discrete populations of neurons, dopamine receptor-1 – and dopamine receptor-2–expressing medium spiny neurons (D1-MSNs and D2-MSNs, respectively). It is unclear whether these populations receive inputs from different brain areas and whether input regions to these cell types undergo distinct structural adaptations in response to the administration of addictive drugs such as cocaine.

Source: Biological Psychiatry - May 9, 2018 Category: Psychiatry Authors: Cindy Barrientos, Daniel Knowland, Mingche M.J. Wu, Varoth Lilascharoen, Kee Wui Huang, Robert C. Malenka, Byung Kook Lim Tags: Archival Report Source Type: research