Elsevier

Neuroscience

Volume 171, Issue 2, 1 December 2010, Pages 485-495
Neuroscience

Cognitive, Behavioral, and Systems Neuroscience
Research Paper
Fos expression in the brains of rats performing an attentional set-shifting task

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neuroscience.2010.09.008Get rights and content
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open access

Abstract

Impairments in executive function and cognitive control are a common feature of neuropsychiatric and neurodegenerative disorders. A promising behavioral paradigm for elucidating the neural mechanisms of executive function is extradimensional/intradimensional (ED/ID) shifting, which places demands on executive function by requiring the adjustment of behavioral responses based on affective or attentional information. To augment the understanding of the brain systems required for these aspects of executive function, we examined the induction of Fos protein in rats tested in the ED/ID paradigm. We found increased Fos-like immunoreactivity (Fos-LI) in several cortical areas, including medial and orbital frontal cortex (OFC), in rats performing affective or attentional shifts relative to rats performing control discriminations. However, increased Fos-LI was also present in rats that performed a yoked number of additional control discrimination trials, without affective or attentional shifting. These observations suggest that cortical networks required for affective and attentional shifting are also activated during comparable discrimination tasks that do not require shifting, consistent with a role for these networks in monitoring ongoing behavior even in situations in which adaptation to changing behavioral demands is not required.

Key words

Fos
prefrontal cortex
intradimensional shift
extradimensional shift
executive function

Abbreviations

CD
compound discrimination
ED
extradimensional
Fos-LI
Fos-like immunoreactivity
GAD67
Glutamic acid decarboxylase 67
ID
intradimensional
IDY
ID yoked
IE
intermediate entorhinal
IEG
immediate-early gene
LE
lateral entorhinal
ME
medial entorhinal
mPFC
medial prefrontal cortex
OFC
orbital frontal cortex
PBS
phosphate buffered saline
PFC
prefrontal cortex
PPC
posterior parietal cortex
PRh
perirhinal cortex
Rev
reversal
SD
simple discrimination

Cited by (0)

1

Present address: Department of Psychiatry, University of Oxford, Neurosciences Building, Warneford Hospital, Oxford, UK.

2

Present address: Eisai Limited, Neurosciences Product Creation Unit, European Knowledge Centre, Mosquito Way, Hatfield, UK.

3

Present address: Pharmagenesis Ltd., Tubney Warren Barn, Tubney, Oxford, UK.

4

Present address: Department of Neuroscience, Mount Sinai School of Medicine, New York, NY, USA.