The status of layer IV in area 4 thus pertains to core organisational features of the cortex, its connections and evolution. “
“Cocaine stimuli often trigger relapse of drug-taking, even following periods of prolonged abstinence. Here, electrophysiological

recordings were made in rats (n = 29) to determine how neurons in the prelimbic (PrL) or infralimbic (IL) regions of the medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) encode cocaine-associated stimuli and cocaine-seeking, and whether this selleck chemicals processing is differentially altered after 1 month of cocaine abstinence. After self-administration training, neurons (n = 308) in the mPFC were recorded during a single test session conducted either the next day or 1 month later. Test sessions consisted of three phases during which (i) the tone–houselight stimulus previously paired with cocaine infusion during self-administration was randomly presented by the experimenter, (ii) rats responded on the lever previously associated with cocaine during extinction and (iii) the tone–houselight

was presented randomly between cocaine-reinforced selleck chemicals llc responding during resumption of cocaine self-administration. PrL neurons showed enhanced encoding of the cocaine stimulus and drug-seeking behavior (under extinction and self-administration) following 30 days of abstinence. In contrast, although IL neurons encoded cocaine cues and cocaine-seeking, there were no pronounced changes

in IL responsiveness following 30 days of abstinence. Importantly, cue-related changes do not represent a generalised stimulus-evoked discharge as PrL and IL neurons in control animals (n = 4) exhibited negligible recruitment by the tone–houselight stimulus. The results support the view that, following abstinence, neural encoding in the PrL but not IL may play a key role in enhanced cocaine-seeking, particularly following re-exposure to cocaine-associated cues. “
“Within most contemporary learning theories, reinforcement prediction error, the difference between the obtained and expected reinforcer value, critically influences associative learning. In some theories, this prediction error determines the momentary effectiveness of the reinforcer itself, such that the same Orotic acid physical event produces more learning when its presentation is surprising than when it is expected. In other theories, prediction error enhances attention to potential cues for that reinforcer by adjusting cue-specific associability parameters, biasing the processing of those stimuli so that they more readily enter into new associations in the future. A unique feature of these latter theories is that such alterations in stimulus associability must be represented in memory in an enduring fashion. Indeed, considerable data indicate that altered associability may be expressed days after its induction.