Analysis of striatal neural activity during an exploration/exploitation task in a virtual environment

PROST A; MURER MG; ZOLD CL

cordoba

Congreso; XXXIII CONGRESO ANUAL SAN 2018; 2018

Sociedad Argentina de Investigacón en Neurociencias

The correct balance between exploration of new territories and exploitation of known resources iskey for an organism's survival. Studies suggest t hat the dorsomedial striatum is involved indecision making and action selection. Our aim is to analyze the activity of striatal single units whilehead fixed mice perform a virtual exploration/exploitation task. The task consists of a virtual lineartrack with short rewarded zones followed by longer unrewarded corridors. Mice are implantedwith tetrodes and a metal plaque that is used for atraumatic head restraint. Mice run on a cylinderand the virtual environment is presented on two monitors in front of them. Running speed isdetected using an optical mouse, and is used to control the speed at which animals navigate thevirtual environment. Upon arrival to a rewarded zone, mice need to lick a spout a certain numberof times to obtain a drop of water. Our results reveal that mice are able to learn the task in handby running through the corridors towards the rewarded area and licking there to obtain a reward.As sessions progress, the animals? behavior becomes more organized restricting their licks to ther ewarded zones. Our results also reveal a change in neuronal activity by increases or decreases offiring rate related to relevant events of the task such as entrance and exit from the rewardedareas or reward delivery. We also found a correlation between striatal firing rate and animals?speed.