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Cited by 109Neurotransmitter Receptor Influence on BehaviorEating Disorders and BehaviorsRegulation of Appetite and Obesity

A specific prelimbic-nucleus accumbens pathway controls resilience versus vulnerability to food addiction

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Domingo-Rodriguez, Laura, Ruiz de Azua, Inigo, Dominguez, Eduardo, Senabre, Eric, Serra, Irene, Kummer, Sami, Navandar, Mohit, Baddenhausen, Sarah +8 more·2020·Nature Communications
DOI 10.1038/s41467-020-14458-yPMC PMC7005839
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Abstract

Food addiction is linked to obesity and eating disorders and is characterized by a loss of behavioral control and compulsive food intake. Here, using a food addiction mouse model, we report that the lack of cannabinoid type-1 receptor in dorsal telencephalic glutamatergic neurons prevents the development of food addiction-like behavior, which is associated with enhanced synaptic excitatory transmission in the medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) and in the nucleus accumbens (NAc). In contrast, chemogenetic inhibition of neuronal activity in the mPFC-NAc pathway induces compulsive food seeking. Transcriptomic analysis and genetic manipulation identified that increased dopamine D2 receptor expression in the mPFC-NAc pathway promotes the addiction-like phenotype. Our study unravels a new neurobiological mechanism underlying resilience and vulnerability to the development of food addiction, which could pave the way towards novel and efficient interventions for this disorder.

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  • A PFC → NAc circuit appears to be involved in compulsive food-seeking behavior.

    “A PFC → NAc circuit appears to be involved in compulsive food-seeking behavior as well, given that chemogenetic inhibition of this circuit led to compulsive food seeking even in the presence of aversive foot shocks (192).”

    From Psychedelics and Other Psychoplastogens for Treating Mental Illness. (2021) · cites this paper as [192]

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Authors
Domingo-Rodriguez, L., Ruiz de Azua, I., Dominguez, E., Senabre, E., Serra, I., Kummer, S., Navandar, M., Baddenhausen, S., Hofmann, C., Andero, R., Gerber, S., Navarrete, M., Dierssen, M., Lutz, B., Martín-García, E., & Maldonado, R.
Affiliations
  • Barcelona Institute of Science and Technology (ES)
  • Universitat Pompeu Fabra (ES)
  • Instituto Cajal (ES)
  • Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz (DE)
  • University Medical Center of the Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz (DE)
  • Hospital Del Mar (ES)
  • Leibniz Institute for Resilience Research (DE)
Corresponding author
Maldonado, Rafael
ORCID
Venue
Nature Communications
Publisher
Springer Science and Business Media LLC
Published
2020-02-07
Volume
11
Issue
1
Pages
782-782
ISSN
2041-1723 (ISSN-L)
DOI
10.1038/s41467-020-14458-y
PMC
PMC7005839
OpenAlex
W3005311857
Cited by
109
References
11
Citations by year
2026: 8 · 2025: 17 · 2024: 17 · 2023: 20 · 2022: 17 · 2021: 23 · 2020: 6 · 2019: 1
FWCI
7.56
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Licence
Locations
  • Nature Communications (publishedVersion, cc-by)
  • PubMed Central (publishedVersion, cc-by)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • RePEc: Research Papers in Economics (submittedVersion)
  • Dipòsit Digital de Documents de la UAB (Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona) (submittedVersion, cc-by)
  • DIGITAL.CSIC (Spanish National Research Council (CSIC)) (submittedVersion, cc-by)
  • DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion)
  • DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion, cc-by-sa)
  • Informationszentrum Lebenswissenschaften (ZB MED) (submittedVersion, cc-by)
  • Repositori digital de la UPF (Universitat Pompeu Fabra) (submittedVersion, cc-by)
Funders
Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad (SAF2017-84060-R-AEI/FEDER-UE)
Topics
  • Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cellular and Molecular Neuroscience › Neurotransmitter Receptor Influence on Behavior
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Clinical Psychology › Eating Disorders and Behaviors
  • Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Endocrine and Autonomic Systems › Regulation of Appetite and Obesity
Keywords
food addiction, vulnerability and resilience, medial prefrontal cortex, nucleus accumbens, cannabinoid type 1 receptor, dopamine D2 receptor, chemogenetic inhibition
MeSH terms
Food Addiction, Animals, Disease Models, Animal, Feeding Behavior, Gene Expression Regulation, Neural Pathways, Synaptic Transmission, Nucleus Accumbens, Up-Regulation, Prefrontal Cortex, Receptors, Dopamine D2, Mice, Knockout, Gene Expression Profiling, Receptor, Cannabinoid, CB1

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