ArticleThe Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience2014
Optogenetic excitation of central amygdala amplifies and narrows incentive motivation to pursue one reward above another.
Article in The Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience, 2014. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 69 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
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Who cites it
69 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 191 citations in OpenAlex.
- How the harm of drugs and their availability affect brain reactions to drug cues: a meta-analysis of 64 neuroimaging activation studies.Translational psychiatry · 2020Pooled it
- The Central Nucleus of the Amygdala Encodes the Motivation to Pursue Ethanol.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2026Article
- Wanting what hurts: D1 dopamine neuronal stimulation in CeA is sufficient to induce maladaptive attraction.Communications biology · 2025Article
- Drug-Related Engrams and Their Role in the Persistence and Recurrence of Drug-Related Behaviors.Hippocampus · 2025Review
- Human amygdala nuclei show distinct developmental trajectories from adolescence to adulthood in functional integration with prefrontal circuitry.Cell reports · 2025Article
- Magnetic-Driven Torque-Induced Electrical Stimulation for Millisecond-Scale Wireless Neuromodulation.Advanced healthcare materials · 2025Article
- Food and water intake are regulated by distinct central amygdala circuits revealed using intersectional genetics.Nature communications · 2025Article
- The Incentive-Sensitization Theory of Addiction 30 Years On.Annual review of psychology · 2025Review
- Prefrontal-Limbic Circuitry Is Associated With Reward Sensitivity in Nonhuman Primates.Biological psychiatry · 2024Article
- Generation and Characterization of a NovelThe Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience · 2024Article
- Encoding and context-dependent control of reward consumption within the central nucleus of the amygdala.iScience · 2024Article
- Optogenetic and chemogenetic approaches reveal differences in neuronal circuits that mediate initiation and maintenance of social interaction.PLoS biology · 2023Article
- Separating desire from prediction of outcome value.Trends in cognitive sciences · 2023Review
- Molecular fingerprints in the hippocampus of alcohol seeking during withdrawal.Research square · 2023Article
- Molecular fingerprints in the hippocampus of alcohol seeking during withdrawal.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2023Article
- Dopamine-mediated striatal activity and function is enhanced in GlyRα2 knockout animals.iScience · 2023Article
- Theoretical Considerations for Optimizing the Use of Optogenetics with Complex Behavior.Current protocols · 2023Article
- Article
- Multimodal mapping of cell types and projections in the central nucleus of the amygdala.eLife · 2023Article
- Effects of central amygdala chemogenetic manipulation and prior chronic alcohol exposure on Pavlovian-to-instrumental transfer.Alcoholism, clinical and experimental research · 2022Article
9 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
3 authors at 2 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
Choosing one reward above another is important for achieving adaptive life goals. Yet hijacked into excessive intensity in disorders such as addiction, single-minded pursuit becomes maladaptive. Here, we report that optogenetic channelrhodopsin stimulation of neurons in central nucleus of amygdala (CeA), paired with earning a particular sucrose reward in rats, amplified and narrowed incentive motivation to that single reward target. Therefore, CeA rats chose and intensely pursued only the laser-paired sucrose reward while ignoring an equally good sucrose alternative. In contrast, reward-paired stimulation of basolateral amygdala did not hijack choice. In a separate measure of incentive motivation, CeA stimulation also increased the progressive ratio breakpoint or level of effort exerted to obtain sucrose reward. However, CeA stimulation by itself failed to support behavioral self-stimulation in the absence of any paired external food reward, suggesting that CeA photo-excitation specifically transformed the value of its external reward (rather than adding an internal reinforcement state). Nor did CeA stimulation by itself induce any aversive state that motivated escape. Finally, CeA stimulation also failed to enhance 'liking' reactions elicited by sucrose taste and did not simply increase the general motivation to eat. This pattern suggests that CeA photo-excitation specifically enhances and narrows incentive motivation to pursue an associated external reward at the expense of another comparable reward.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.