BIOM30001 Lecture Notes - Lecture 27: Morphine, Nucleus Accumbens, Tegmentum
Document Summary
Emotional stimuli are related to actions e. g. a baby may like sucrose, over time learns where to obtain those tastes. Certain stimuli (e. g. mcdonald"s m) can then elicit a wanting phase to drive the baby to obtain the stimuli (reward) Rat is in one chamber and is given morphine in one but not the other. Rats will spend more time in chamber where morphine was given. Implanting electrodes into certain parts of the brain. Rodents would press a lever (hundreds of time) to get electrical stimulation to certain parts of the brain. Ventral tegmental area: projections from here (a10 nucleus) to the accumbens and prefrontal cortex is a dopamine system (a diffuse catecholamine system in the brain) Small number of dopamine neurons in midbrain: have massive projections to basal forebrain and emotional processing areas (prefrontal cortex, cingulate cortex, amygdala) Animal will learn to lever press to get cocaine injections.
