Phasic stimulation in the nucleus accumbens enhances learning after traumatic brain injury
Abstract
Traumatic brain injury (TBI) is a significant cause of morbidity and mortality worldwide. Despite improvements in survival, treatments that improve functional outcome remain lacking. There is, therefore, a pressing need to develop novel treatments to improve functional recovery. Here, we investigated task-matched deep-brain stimulation of the nucleus accumbens (NAc) to augment reinforcement learning in a rodent model of TBI. We demonstrate that task-matched deep brain stimulation (DBS) of the NAc can enhance learning following TBI. We further demonstrate that animals receiving DBS exhibited greater behavioral improvement and enhanced neural proliferation. Treated animals recovered to an uninjured behavioral baseline and showed retention of improved performance even after stimulation was stopped. These results provide encouraging early evidence for the potential of NAc DBS to improve functional outcomes following TBI and that its effects may be broad, with alterations in neurogenesis and synaptogenesis.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Pub Defense Publication
- Publication Date
- Apr 01, 2022
- Source ID
- 10.1093/texcom/tgac016
Entities
People
- Anna L Huguenard
- Edward R. Bader
- Emad N. Eskandar
- Graham Mulvaney
- Husam A. Katnani
- Jimmy C. Yang
- Joshua P. Aronson
Organizations
- Albert Einstein College of Medicine
- Dartmouth–Hitchcock Medical Center
- Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency
- Harvard Medical School