Check out our new paper on feeding in Nature Communications 🔥! Along the way we answer a question that has puzzled philosophers for centuries: Does activation of periaqueductal gray (PAG) vgat cells make mice follow ping-pong balls?

RT @JoJoLab5: I’m excited to share a new paper from the lab. The study led by Xiaowei Gu reveals how the mPFC encodes complex emotional mem….

Thank you to our funders.@NIMHgov, @NIDDKgov, @NIH, @BBRFoundation,.@NSF. Thank you @SfNJournals for a thoughtful review process. Also thank you to Dr. Fernando Reis for creating the first version of the FUGA task.

These data support the emerging view that the hypothalamus not only controls survival drives, but that it also influences learning processes.

Lastly, we show that PMd neural activity represents distance to the moving threat in FUGA, but it is not activated by a fear conditioned tone.

We also show that PMd inhibition during fear acquisition does not impair fear in classic assays such as contextual or auditory cued fear conditioning.

Next we show that inhibition of the hypothalamic dorsal premammillary nucleus (PMd) during FUGA acquisition impairs learned escape the next day in retrieval, revealing the PMd affects learning!

In the FUGA task, mice associate the movement of a shock grid with threat in a single session. Subsequent grid movements in the absence of shock elicit rapid flight upon grid approach (FUGA). This assay aims to induce learned escape by simulating predatory chase.

Check out our new paper in the Journal of Neuroscience led by talented co-first authors @AnitaTorossian and @DeaditeBlake 🔥! We show how the hypothalamic dorsal premammillary nucleus (PMd) controls the acquisition of conditioned escape in a novel task.

RT @KateWassum: 🚨📃New Wassum Lab Paper📃🚨. @Jackie_Gio discovered brain pathways that support agency and habit and how chronic stress disrup….

Thank you Brain and Behavior Research Foundation @bbrf for funding and highlighting our research on food-seeking circuits!

RT @ViditaVaidya: Really glad to have this work identifying the key role of PV-neurons in the ventral hippocampus in gating the anxiolytic….

@ladenardo @KateWassum @TheHongLab @michael_krashes @baljit_khakh @JonathanCKao @Profa_Correa Also thank you to @AmberAlhadeff for valuable comments on this grant!!.

Thank you for Fernando Reis and other lab members for all their work! Thank you also for grant comments from @ladenardo @KateWassum @TheHongLab @michael_krashes and to co-investigators @baljit_khakh @JonathanCKao @Profa_Correa.

Today is Notice of Award day! I am so proud of our team for this R01 grant from @NIDDKgov about feeding circuits. Please apply if you wish to be a postdoc with us! Our first feeding paper is out in @NatureComms

RT @folha: Pesquisadores descobrem neurônios que deflagram a busca frenética por alimentos.

Take a look at this work from my awesome colleague @pgolshani, where they report how to make an open source affordable two-photon miniscope for mice!!

RT @KateWassum: Come work with us in sunny SoCal: We’re recruiting a postdoc!!!. We’re an inclusive team of behavioral neuroscientists tryi….

I would be happy to present this paper to your lab meeting virtually or in-person at your university. Please message me if interested!

Thank you also to our funders @NIMHgov, @NIDDKgov, @NIH, @BBRFoundation, @NSF, @AgencyFAPESP, Hellman, @LauraMickelsen @NatureComms for for a thoughtful review process, and to my mentors @NIMHDirector and @KarlDeisseroth