Habituation reduces novelty-induced FOS expression in the striatum and cingulate cortex

Abstract

Exposure to novel environments is known to induce c-fos expression in the cingulate cortex and dorsomedial striatum. This study examined the effects of 1, 3, and 7 days of exposure to sequential exposure to three novel environments. It was hypothesized that the ability of novel environment shuttling (NES) would induce c-fos expression as indicated by cells displaying FOS-like immunoreactivity (FLI) in the striatum and cingulate cortex which would decrease with repeated exposure. NES elicited FLI in both the cingulate cortex and striatum when compared to home-cage controls and this effect was attenuated with repeated exposure. Behavioral measures of activity decreased with repeated exposure suggesting that the decrease in FLI may be due to either a reduction in motor activity or increasing familiarity with the environments.

Overlapping and Distinct Brain Regions Associated with the Anxiolytic Effects of Chlordiazepoxide and Chronic Fluoxetine

“…Novelty increased c-fos expression in the dCA2, Cg, and Pir and decreased c-fos expression in the STLP. Similar responses to novelty have been reported previously for the Cg (Stone et al, 2006a, b;Struthers et al, 2005;Wirtshafter, 2005), Pir (Stone et al, 2006a, b) and dCA2 (Wirtshafter, 2005) in other contexts. The patterns of change observed here were consistent across the three experiments, suggesting that these are reliable and meaningful observations.…”

Adult hippocampal neurogenesis and c-Fos induction during escalation of voluntary wheel running in C57BL/6J mice

“…Typically, c-Fos habituates after repeated exposure to a stimulus [e.g., restraint stress, novel environment, immune stimulation, or drug exposure, 9, 20, 33, 36]. Running is an unusual c-Fos-evoking stimulus, as the up regulation of c-Fos in the dentate gyrus is known to persist after as many as 40 days of continuous access to running wheels [6], and in the present study 50 days (Fig.…”

Environmental enrichment decreases the rewarding but not the activating effects of heroin

“…Mice raised in EE are exposed every week to a novel environment which they explore and interact with. Given that the ability of the novel environment to induce immediate early gene expression is attenuated with repeated exposures (Struthers et al 2005), it is possible that rapid habituation to locomotor chambers in EE mice (Bezard et al 2003) may have led to a reduced expression of zif-268 in the cingulate cortex.…”