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The structural basis for mapping behavior onto the ventral striatum and its subdivisions

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Abstract

The striatum can be divided into dorsal (caudate-putamen) and ventral parts. In the ventral division, the nucleus accumbens, which subserves adaptive and goal-directed behaviors, is further subdivided into shell and core. Accumbal neurons show different types of experience-dependent plasticity: those in the core seem to discriminate the motivational value of conditioned stimuli, features that rely on the integration of information and enhanced synaptic plasticity at the many spines on these cells, whereas shell neurons seem to be involved with the release of predetermined behavior patterns in relation to unconditioned stimuli, and the behavioral consequences of repeated administration of addictive drugs. In the core, the principal neurons are medium sized and densely spiny, but in the medial shell, these same neurons are much smaller and their dendrites, significantly less spiny, suggesting that morphological differences could mediate unique neuroadaptations associated with each region. This review is focused on evaluating the structural differences in nucleus accumbens core and shell neurons and discusses how such different morphologies could underlie distinguishable behavioral processes.

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Acknowledgments

This work was partly supported by USPHS grants from NIH: DA 016662 (GEM), DA 09311 (AEK), MH 74723 (BAB), and DA 016465 (MA).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Cellular and Molecular Pharmacology, Chicago Medical School, Rosalind Franklin University of Medicine and Science, 3333 Green Bay Road, North Chicago, IL, 60064, USA

    Gloria E. Meredith

  2. Department of Psychiatry, University of Wisconsin-Madison Medical School, 6001 Research Park Boulevard, Madison, WI, 53719, USA

    Brian A. Baldo, Matthew E. Andrezjewski & Ann E. Kelley

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  1. Gloria E. Meredith
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  4. Ann E. Kelley
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Correspondence to Gloria E. Meredith.

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Dr. Ann Kelley died on August 5, 2007, before this manuscript was complete. We would now like to honor and remember both Dr. Heimer, who died on March 12, 2007, and Dr. Kelley, distinguished neuroscientists, both of whom made profound contributions to our understanding of the ventral striatum. Indeed, the conceptual framework for this article grew out of discussions that occurred at the 1999 conference, “Advancing from the ventral striatum to the extended amygdala,” held in honor of Dr. Heimer’s retirement. Drs. Heimer and Kelley respected each other’s work enormously, and it pleased Ann Kelley that her work would be represented in this tribute to Lennart Heimer. Both scientists sincerely hoped that, just as their own work had been inspired by the great neuroanatomists of the twentieth century, the next generation would carry on the excitement and intellectual adventure of trying to uncover the biological basis of that which makes us most human––our emotional life.

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Meredith, G.E., Baldo, B.A., Andrezjewski, M.E. et al. The structural basis for mapping behavior onto the ventral striatum and its subdivisions. Brain Struct Funct 213, 17–27 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00429-008-0175-3

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