Rewards are crucial objects that induce learning, approach behavior, choices, and
emotions. Whereas emotions are difficult to investigate in animals, the learning function is …

The ventral tegmental area (VTA) is best known for its robust dopaminergic projections to
forebrain regions and their critical role in regulating reward, motivation, cognition, and …

Activity in motor cortex predicts specific movements seconds before they occur, but how this
preparatory activity relates to upcoming movements is obscure. We dissected the conversion …

Accurately predicting an outcome requires that animals learn supporting and conflicting
evidence from sequential experience. In mammals and invertebrates, learned fear …

Progressive depletion of midbrain dopamine neurons (PDD) is associated with deficits in the
initiation, speed, and fluidity of voluntary movement. Models of basal ganglia function focus …

Animals adapt their behavior in response to informative sensory cues using multiple brain
circuits. The activity of midbrain dopaminergic neurons is thought to convey a critical …

Synaptic inhibition, brought about by a rich variety of interneuron types, counters excitation,
modulates the gain, timing, tuning, bursting properties of principal cell firing, and exerts …

Striatal acetylcholine and dopamine critically regulate movement, motivation, and reward-
related learning. Pauses in cholinergic interneuron (CIN) firing are thought to coincide with …

The ventral pallidum (VP) contains GABA and glutamate neurons projecting to ventral
tegmental area (VTA) whose stimulation drives approach and avoidance, respectively. Yet …

Midbrain dopaminergic (DA) neurons in the substantia nigra pars compacta and ventral
tegmental area regulate extrapyramidal movement and important cognitive functions …