Project Summary

Ornella Valenti, Ph.D. (Young Investigator 2007) of the University of Pittsburgh, notes that the ability to deal with emotionally charged stimuli and to learn from experience which potential threatening events are worthy of attention are skills that are essential to survival. To understand how the brain controls and regulates emotional expression, Dr. Valenti will study the features of learned emotional responses and the ability to ignore events that are no longer threatening (known as extinction of conditioned fear). The amygdala mediates expression of emotion and learning the association between stimuli and emotional events, and has now been implicated in extinction as well. However, extinction appears to also be dependent on higher cortical regions in its ability to regulate emotional learning accordingly to environmental circumstances. Dr. Valenti will investigate the mPFC pyramidal neuron response to an extinguished vs. non-extinguished stimulus in anesthetized rats that have received extinction training while awake. She hopes to gain insight into how the regulation of information flow between the mPFC and the amygdala takes place, and the role of these processes in extinction consolidation or perseveration of conditioning, as well as how these events can be modulated by compounds, such as D-cycloserine, that have been suggested as adjuncts to behavioral exposure therapy in the treatment of certain treatment-resistant anxiety disorders.

Program Area: ANXIETY DISORDERS\Anxiety Disorder

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