Dissociation of dopamine release in the nucleus accumbens from intracranial self-stimulation
Abstract
Mesolimbic dopamine-releasing neurons appear to be important in the brain reward system. One behavioural paradigm that supports this hypothesis is intracranial self-stimulation (ICS), during which animals repeatedly press a lever to stimulate their own dopamine-releasing neurons electrically. Here we study dopamine release from dopamine terminals in the nucleus accumbens core and shell in the brain by using rapid-responding voltammetric microsensors during electrical stimulation of dopamine cell bodies in the ventral tegmental area/substantia nigra brain regions. In rats in which stimulating electrode placement failed to elicit dopamine release in the nucleus accumbens, ICS behaviour was not learned. In contrast, ICS was acquired when stimulus trains evoked extracellular dopamine in either the core or the shell of the nucleus accumbens. In animals that could learn ICS, experimenter-delivered stimulation always elicited dopamine release. In contrast, extracellular dopamine was rarely observed during ICS itself. Thus, although activation of mesolimbic dopamine-releasing neurons seems to be a necessary condition for ICS, evoked dopamine release is actually diminished during ICS. Dopamine may therefore be a neural substrate for novelty or reward expectation rather than reward itself.
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Electrical brain stimulation at the medial forebrain bundle/VTA is rewarding and triggers dopamine release in the ventral striatum and investigatory responses of sniffing.
“Electrical brain stimulation at the medial forebrain bundle/VTA is rewarding and triggers dopamine release in the ventral striatum (Fiorino et al., 1993; Garris et al., 1999; Cheer et al., 2005; Hernandez et al., 2006) and investigatory responses of sniffing (Clarke and Trowill, 1971; Ikemoto and Panksepp, 1994).”
From Dopamine reward circuitry: Two projection systems from the ventral midbrain to the nucleus accumbens–olfactory tubercle complex (2007) · cites this paper as Garris et al., 1999
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- Authors
- Garris, P. A., Kilpatrick, M., Bunin, M. A., Michael, D., Walker, Q. D., & Wightman, R. M.
- Affiliations
- Illinois State University (US)
- University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (US)
- Corresponding author
- Wightman, R. Mark
- Venue
- Nature
- Published
- 1999-03
- Volume
- 398
- Issue
- 6722
- Pages
- 67-69
- ISSN
- 0028-0836 (ISSN-L)
- 1476-4687
- OpenAlex
- W1488877099
- Cited by
- 327
- References
- 29
- Citations by year
- 2025: 4 · 2024: 4 · 2023: 9 · 2022: 8 · 2021: 5 · 2020: 5 · 2019: 8 · 2018: 9 · 2017: 12 · 2016: 7 · 2015: 16 · 2014: 8 · 2013: 7 · 2012: 8
- FWCI
- 8.25
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Licence
- www.springer.com/tdm (tdm)
- Locations
- Nature (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- RePEc: Research Papers in Economics (submittedVersion)
- Topics
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cellular and Molecular Neuroscience › Neurotransmitter Receptor Influence on Behavior
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Neural and Behavioral Psychology Studies
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cellular and Molecular Neuroscience › Neuroscience and Neuropharmacology Research
- Keywords
- dopamine release, nucleus accumbens, intracranial self-stimulation, mesolimbic dopamine system, ventral tegmental area, substantia nigra, brain reward system, dopaminergic terminals, reward anticipation, novelty
- MeSH terms
- Animals, Conditioning, Classical, Dopamine, Electric Stimulation, Male, Microelectrodes, Neurons, Nucleus Accumbens, Reward, Self Stimulation, Rats, Sprague-Dawley, Rats
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