There is strong evidence that two cerebral hemispheres are differentially involved in emotional memory and that amygdala is a key subcortical structure for emotional experience. The present research investigated the possible involvement of lateralization of basolateral amygdala (BLA) and central amygdala (CEA) in place avoidance memory. For this purpose, male Long-Evans rats (280-320 g) were im...

Amygdala is widely known as a critical neural hub for modulating negative emotions such fear and anxiety. Recent studies have shown that the basolateral amygdala (BLA) has reciprocal innervation, which plays an important role in regulating social interaction associative memory. However, connectivity pattern functional of contralateral projecting BLA neurons stress-related anxiety are not fully ...

The amygdala processes and directs inputs and outputs that are key to fear behavior. However, whether it directly senses fear-evoking stimuli is unknown. Because the amygdala expresses acid-sensing ion channel-1a (ASIC1a), and ASIC1a is required for normal fear responses, we hypothesized that the amygdala might detect a reduced pH. We found that inhaled CO(2) reduced brain pH and evoked fear be...

We have studied mechanisms underlying long-term potentiation (LTP) in the medial and lateral amygdala using in vitro slice preparations. In normal bathing medium, LTP was not induced by tetanic stimulation (100 pulses at 100 Hz). However, in the presence of a GABAA blocker, picrotoxin or bicuculline, LTP was reproducibly induced in both medial and lateral amygdala. In the medial amygdala, the L...

Background: Converging lines of evidence have implicated the amygdala in the pathophysiology of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). We previously developed a method for measuring automatic amygdala responses to general threat-related stimuli; in conjunction with functional magnetic resonance imaging, we used a passive viewing task involving masked presentations of human facial stimuli. Method...

The amygdala is critically involved in detecting emotionally salient stimuli and in enhancing memory for emotional information. Growing evidence also suggests that the amygdala plays a crucial role in addiction, perhaps by strengthening associations between emotionally-charged drug cues and drug-seeking behavior. In the current study, by integrating functional MRI (fMRI), genetics, and outcome ...

The human amygdala responds to first impressions of people as judged from their faces, such as normative judgments about the trustworthiness of strangers. It is unknown, however, whether amygdala responses to first impressions can be validated by objective criteria. Here, we examined amygdala responses to faces of Chief Executive Officers (CEOs) where real-world outcomes could be measured objec...

Neural stimuli associated with traumatic events can readily become conditioned so as to reinstate the memory of the original trauma.These conditioned fear responses can last a lifetime and may be especially resistant to extinction. A large amount of data from many di¡erent laboratories indicate that the amygdala plays a crucial role in conditioned fear.The amygdala receives information from all...