ArticleNeuron2022
Plasticity of neural connections underlying oxytocin-mediated parental behaviors of male mice.
Article in Neuron, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 43 papers.
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Who cites it
43 citing papers in PubMed, 72 citations in OpenAlex.
- Neural circuits for mammalian parental behaviour.Nature reviews. Neuroscience · 2026Review
- Transcriptomic landscape of microglia in mouse models of social dysfunction and oxytocin-mediated recovery.iScience · 2026Article
- Distinct projections of PVN oxytocin neurons regulate the divergent defensive behaviors in response to social threat.Science advances · 2026Article
- Article
- Complementary influences of noradrenaline and dopamine in orchestrating a motivated social behavior.Current opinion in neurobiology · 2026Review
- Paternal behavior is controlled by preoptic Trpc5 neurons.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2026Article
- The neural control of infanticide and parental behaviors in male mice.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2026Article
- Appetitive maternal behavior in mice is resistant to perinatal chronic variable stress and perinatal chronic corticosterone treatment.Hormones and behavior · 2026Article
- A holistic review of fatherhood in humans and non-human animals: mechanisms of fatherhood, effects on fathers themselves, and interactions of fathers with others.Frontiers in behavioral neuroscience · 2026Review
- Circuit logic of oxytocin and vasopressin complementary actions.Frontiers in neuroscience · 2026Review
- Vasopressin-to-oxytocin receptor crosstalk in the preoptic area underlying parental behaviors in male mice.Nature communications · 2025Article
- Neural plasticity supporting parental behaviors.Current opinion in neurobiology · 2025Review
- Artificially induced torpor during pregnancy impairs fetal growth in mice.Scientific reports · 2025Article
- Orbitofrontal cortex influences dopamine dynamics associated with alloparental behavioral acquisition in female mice.Science advances · 2025Article
- Brain circuits that regulate social behavior.Molecular psychiatry · 2025Review
- Complexity of the Hypothalamic Oxytocin System and its Involvement in Brain Functions and Diseases.Neuroscience bulletin · 2025Review
- Stress and parental behaviors.Neuroscience research · 2025Review
- The paraventricular nucleus of the hypothalamus: a key node in the control of behavioural states.The Journal of physiology · 2025Review
- Neuronal Properties in the Lateral Habenula and Adult-Newborn Interactions in Virgin Female and Male Mice.eNeuro · 2025Article
- A transgenic mouse line for rabies virus-mediated trans-synaptic tracing in the postnatal developing brain.PloS one · 2025Article
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Authors and funding
8 authors at 2 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
The adult brain can flexibly adapt behaviors to specific life-stage demands. For example, while sexually naive male mice are aggressive to the conspecific young, they start to provide caregiving to infants around the time when their own young are expected. How such behavioral plasticity is implemented at the level of neural connections remains poorly understood. Here, using viral-genetic approaches, we establish hypothalamic oxytocin neurons as the key regulators of the parental caregiving behaviors of male mice. We then use rabies-virus-mediated unbiased screening to identify excitatory neural connections originating from the lateral hypothalamus to the oxytocin neurons to be drastically strengthened when male mice become fathers. These connections are functionally relevant, as their activation suppresses pup-directed aggression in virgin males. These results demonstrate the life-stage associated, long-distance, and cell-type-specific plasticity of neural connections in the hypothalamus, the brain region that is classically assumed to be hard-wired.
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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.