RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 Examining Brain Activity Responses during Rat Ultrasonic Vocalization Playback: Insights from a Novel fMRI Translational Paradigm
JF eneuro
JO eNeuro
FD Society for Neuroscience
SP ENEURO.0179-23.2024
DO 10.1523/ENEURO.0179-23.2024
VO 11
IS 10
A1 Granata, Lauren E.
A1 Chang, Arnold
A1 Shaheed, Habiba
A1 Shinde, Anjali
A1 Kulkarni, Praveen
A1 Satpute, Ajay
A1 Brenhouse, Heather C.
A1 Honeycutt, Jennifer A.
YR 2024
UL http://www.eneuro.org/content/11/10/ENEURO.0179-23.2024.abstract
AB Despite decades of preclinical investigation, there remains limited understanding of the etiology and biological underpinnings of anxiety disorders. Sensitivity to potential threat is characteristic of anxiety-like behavior in humans and rodents, but traditional rodent behavioral tasks aimed to assess threat responsiveness lack translational value, especially with regard to emotionally valenced stimuli. Therefore, development of novel preclinical approaches to serve as analogues to patient assessments is needed. In humans, the fearful face task is widely used to test responsiveness to socially communicated threat signals. In rats, ultrasonic vocalizations (USVs) are analogous social cues associated with positive or negative affective states that can elicit behavioral changes in the receiver. It is therefore likely that when rats hear aversive alarm call USVs (22 kHz), they evoke translatable changes in brain activity comparable with the fearful face task. We used functional magnetic resonance imaging in male and female rats to assess changes in BOLD activity induced by exposure to aversive 22 kHz alarm calls emitted in response to threatening stimuli, prosocial (55 kHz) USVs emitted in response to appetitive stimuli, or a computer-generated 22 kHz tone. Results show patterns of regional activation that are specific to each USV stimulus. Notably, limbic regions clinically relevant to psychiatric disorders (e.g., amygdala, bed nucleus of the stria terminalis) are preferentially activated by either aversive 22 kHz or appetitive 55 kHz USVs. These results support the use of USV playback as a promising translational tool to investigate affective processing under conditions of distal threat in preclinical rat models.