A neural model of mutual antagonism between hunger and maternal behavior.

At present, there has been more analysis of the neural loop mechanism of single behavior occurring, and there is little research on how animals work together to balance individual survival and racial reproduction. On November 20,
, the journal Neuroscience published an online paper entitled "Agrp neurons projected into the inner pre-visual region and regulate maternal nesting behavior", which was completed by Xu Xiaohong Of.
they found: 1. Agrp neurons that control feeding behavior have inhibitory projection of the inner pre-visual pre-visual region that controls maternal behavior; 2. Optogenetics activate Agrp neurons to specifically reduce maternal nesting behavior without affecting the behavior of cubs, partially simulating the inhibition of maternal behavior; 3. Optogenetics stimulates The projection of Agrp neurons to the inner pre-visual region with equal specific inhibition of maternal nesting behavior, and Ag-stimulation The projection of rp neurons to the outer region of the hypothalamus had no significant effect on maternal behavior; 4. The neurons in the inner pre-visual pre-region that received Agrp projection were Vgat-plus neurons; 5. Optogenetics or chemicalgenetic inhibition of the inner pre-visual pre-vision region Ofdita-neurons also inhibited maternal nesting behavior; and 6. The cluster of neurons involved in maternal nesting behavior in the inner prefrontal region may be different from those involved in the behavior of cubs.
combined with the team's previous research on the suppression of hunger in pups (Han et al., Neuroscience, 2017) and the study of the inner pre-visual area Esr1 plus neurons to control the behavior of cubs (Wei et al., Nature Communications, 2018), the paper presents a neural model of mutual adyment between hunger and maternal behavior (see chart).
: A neural model of mutual inta-insinuation between hunger and maternal behavior.
Agrp neurons promote feeding; the inner pre-vision vgat-/Esr1-plus neurons promote the behavior of cubs, while vgat-es1-neurons are more important for maternal nesting behavior. the activation of The Agrp neurons during
hunger leads to the inhibition of the Vgat-plus neurons in the pre-frontal region of the inner vision, while inhibiting maternal nesting behavior without affecting the behavior of the cubs.
parallel, the cubs delay and inhibit feeding behavior by parallelly activating mPOA Vglut2 plus neurons.
3V, third ventricle; acp, former joint, arc, bow core; mPOA, inner front altnessy.
the study is the first to show that hunger and maternal behavior can interact with each other, in order to coordinate the relationship between different behaviors.
this work was jointly completed by Xu Xiaohong's group of doctoral students Li Xingyu, Han Ying and research assistant Zhang Wei, and the measurement of body temperature was carried out by Shen Wei's research group at Shanghai University of Science and Technology.
the work is funded by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (31471065, 31771169) and the Chinese Academy of Sciences Strategic Pilot Science and Technology Special (XDB02030005, XDBS01010200).
Source: Institute of Neuroscience.