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Endocannabinoid Hedonic Hotspot for Sensory Pleasure: Anandamide in Nucleus Accumbens Shell Enhances ‘Liking’ of a Sweet Reward
Abstract
Cannabinoid drugs such as Delta9-THC are euphoric and rewarding, and also stimulate food intake in humans and animals. Little is known about how naturally occurring endogenous brain cannabinoids mediate pleasure from food or other natural sensory rewards. The taste reactivity paradigm measures effects of brain manipulations on affective orofacial reactions to intraorally administered pleasant and unpleasant tastes. Here we tested if anandamide microinjection into medial nucleus accumbens shell enhances these affective reactions to sweet and bitter tastes in rats. Anandamide doubled the number of positive 'liking' reactions elicited by intraoral sucrose, without altering negative 'disliking' reactions to bitter quinine. Anandamide microinjections produced Fos plumes of approximately 0.02-1 mm3 volume. Plume-based maps, integrated with behavioral data, identified the medial shell of accumbens as the anatomical hotspot responsible for hedonic amplification. Anandamide produced especially intense hedonic enhancement in a roughly 1.6 mm3 'hedonic hotspot' in dorsal medial shell, where anandamide also stimulated eating behavior. These results demonstrate that endocannabinoid signals within medial accumbens shell specifically amplify the positive hedonic impact of a natural reward (though identification of the receptor specificity of this effect will require future studies). Identification of an endocannabinoid hotspot for sensory pleasure gives insight into brain mechanisms of natural reward, and may be relevant to understanding the neural effects of cannabinoid drugs of abuse and therapeutic agents.
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“Responsiveness to reward also involves the nucleus accumbens (in addition to other regions, such as the ventral pallidum), but opioids and endocannabinoids are the major neurochemical mediators of reward responsiveness (Mahler et al., 2007; Peciña and Berridge, 2005).”
From The effects of early life stress on reward processing (2018) · cites this paper as Mahler et al., 2007
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Dissecting components of reward: ‘liking’, ‘wanting’, and learning
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“Beyond opioid signals , endocannabinoid stimulation by microinjections of anandamide similarly enhances ''liking'' reactions in an overlapping subregion of the NAc medial shell (Mahler et al., 2007).”
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“exist in medial shell for anandamide, which likely acts by stimulating the CB1 type of cannabinoid receptor [55,77].”
Background
Metadata
- Authors
- Mahler, S. V., Smith, K. S., & Berridge, K. C.
- Affiliations
- University of Michigan (US)
- Venue
- Neuropsychopharmacology
- Published
- 2007-04-04
- Volume
- 32
- Issue
- 11
- Pages
- 2267-2278
- ISSN
- 0893-133X (ISSN-L)
- 1740-634X
- OpenAlex
- W2096012985
- Semantic Scholar
- c3722206c8cdf7589109f0c15c2ec82f8c398a76
- Cited by
- 377
- References
- 60
- Citations by year
- 2026: 8 · 2025: 12 · 2024: 9 · 2023: 16 · 2022: 27 · 2021: 19 · 2020: 16 · 2019: 18 · 2018: 22 · 2017: 22 · 2016: 21 · 2015: 24 · 2014: 19 · 2013: 24 · 2012: 33
- FWCI
- 15.07
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Licence
- www.springer.com/tdm (tdm)
- Locations
- Neuropsychopharmacology (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Funders
- National Institutes of Health (DC00011)
- National Institute of Mental Health (MH063649, R01MH063649)
- National Institute on Drug Abuse (DC00011, DA021481, DA015188, R01DA015188, F31DA021481)
- National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders (DC-00011)
- Topics
- Health Sciences › Medicine › Pharmacology (medical) › Cannabis and Cannabinoid Research
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cellular and Molecular Neuroscience › Neurotransmitter Receptor Influence on Behavior
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Sensory Systems › Olfactory and Sensory Function Studies
- Keywords
- anandamide, endocannabinoids, nucleus accumbens shell, sensory pleasure, taste reactivity, sucrose, quinine, Fos expression, natural reward, dietary habits
- MeSH terms
- Analysis of Variance, Animals, Arachidonic Acids, Behavior, Animal, Dose-Response Relationship, Drug, Feeding Behavior, Food Preferences, Gene Expression Regulation, Male, Microinjections, Nucleus Accumbens, Reaction Time, Reward, Sucrose, Sweetening Agents, Taste, Oncogene Proteins v-fos, Rats, Sprague-Dawley, Rats, Polyunsaturated Alkamides, Cannabinoid Receptor Modulators, Endocannabinoids
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