Freezing suppression by oxytocin in central amygdala allows alternate defensive behaviours and mother-pup interactions
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When animals and their offspring are threatened, parents switch from self-defense to offspring protection. How self-defense is suppressed remains elusive. We postulated that suppression of the self-defense response, freezing, is gated via oxytocin acting in the centro-lateral amygdala (CeL). We found that rat dams conditioned to fear an odor, froze when tested alone, whereas if pups were present, they remained in close contact with them or targeted the threat. Furthermore, blocking oxytocin signaling in the CeL prevented the suppression of maternal freezing. Finally, pups exposed to the odor in the presence of the conditioned dam later froze when re-exposed alone. However, if oxytocin signaling in the dam had been blocked, pups failed to learn. This study provides a functional role for the well-described action of oxytocin in the central amygdala, and demonstrates that self-defense suppression allows for active pup protection and mother-pup interactions crucial for pup threat learning.
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The implication of CeA OXT signaling in processing threat responses and social fear suggests a specific role in detection of fear-mediated responses.
“The implication of CeA OXT signaling in processing threat responses [22,94,104] and social fear [105] would suggest a specific role in the detection of fear-mediated responses.”
From Oxytocin Signaling in the Central Amygdala Modulates Emotion Discrimination in Mice (2019) · cites this paper as [94]
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Abbreviations Used for Major Brain Regions
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- Authors
- Rickenbacher, E., Perry, R. E., Sullivan, R. M., & Moita, M. A.
- Affiliations
- Champalimaud Neuroscience Programme, LIsboa, Portugal
- Nathan Kline Institute for Psychiatric Research (US)
- Corresponding author
- Moita, Marta A
- Venue
- eLife
- Publisher
- eLife Sciences Publications, Ltd
- Published
- 2017-06-13
- Volume
- 6
- ISSN
- 2050-084X (ISSN-L)
- PMC
- PMC5469614
- OpenAlex
- W2625455496
- Cited by
- 81
- References
- 72
- Citations by year
- 2026: 5 · 2025: 5 · 2024: 5 · 2023: 9 · 2022: 9 · 2021: 7 · 2020: 24 · 2019: 4 · 2018: 10 · 2017: 3
- FWCI
- 16.06
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- gold
- doi.org
- Licence
- Locations
- eLife (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- Europe PMC (PubMed Central) (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- PubMed Central (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion, cc-by-sa)
- Funders
- H2020 European Research Council (337747-C.o.C.O.)
- Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (SFRH/51257/2020)
- National Institutes of Health (R37HD083217, MH091451)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Social Psychology › Neuroendocrine regulation and behavior
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Memory and Neural Mechanisms
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Behavioral Neuroscience › Stress Responses and Cortisol
- Keywords
- oxytocin, central amygdala, freezing behavior, maternal behavior, mother-pup interaction, fear conditioning, odor aversion
- MeSH terms
- Animals, Animals, Newborn, Behavior, Animal, Maternal Behavior, Mothers, Oxytocin, Rats, Central Amygdaloid Nucleus
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