Anxiety and Nicotine Dependence: Emerging Role of the Habenulo-Interpeduncular Axis

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• 作者：Susanna Molas¹ ; Steven R. DeGroot¹ ; ² ; Rubing Zhao-Shea¹ ; Andrew R. Tapper¹ ; ^{andrew.tapper@umassmed.edu}
• 关键词：anxiety ; fear ; medial habenula ; interpeduncular nucleus ; nicotine withdrawal
• 刊名：Trends in Pharmacological Sciences
• 出版年：2017
• 出版时间：February 2017
• 年：2017
• 卷：38
• 期：2
• 页码：169-180
• 全文大小：2618 K
• 卷排序：38

文摘

While innovative modern neuroscience approaches have aided in discerning brain circuitry underlying negative emotional behaviors including fear and anxiety responses, how these circuits are recruited in normal and pathological conditions remains poorly understood. Recently, genetic tools that selectively manipulate single neuronal populations have uncovered an understudied circuit, the medial habenula (mHb)–interpeduncular (IPN) axis, that modulates basal negative emotional responses. Interestingly, the mHb–IPN pathway also represents an essential circuit that signals heightened anxiety induced by nicotine withdrawal. Insights into how this circuit interconnects with regions more classically associated with anxiety, and how chronic nicotine exposure induces neuroadaptations resulting in an anxiogenic state, may thereby provide novel strategies and molecular targets for therapies that facilitate smoking cessation, as well as for anxiety relief.