SMART: An open source extension of WholeBrain for iDISCO+ LSFM intact mouse brain registration and segmentation

bioRxiv. 2019 August 6. doi: 10.1101/727529

Jin M, Nguyen JD, Weber SJ, Mejias-Aponte CA, Madangopal R, Golden SA.

Mapping immediate early gene (IEG) expression across intact brains is becoming a popular approach for identifying the brain-wide activity patterns underlying behavior. Registering whole brains to an anatomical atlas presents a technical challenge that has predominantly been tackled using automated voxel-based registration methods; however, these methods may fail when brains are damaged or only partially imaged, can be challenging to correct, and require substantial computational power. Here we present an open source package in R called SMART (semi-manual alignment to reference templates) as an extension to the WholeBrain framework for automated segmentation and semi-automated registration of experimental images to vectorized atlas plates from the Allen Brain Institute Mouse Common Coordinate Framework (CCF).

The SMART package was created with the novice programmer in mind and introduces a streamlined pipeline for aligning, registering, and segmenting large LSFM volumetric datasets with the CCF across the anterior-posterior axis, using a simple ‘choice game’ and interactive user-friendly menus. SMART further provides the flexibility to register partial brains or discrete user-chosen experimental images across the CCF, making it compatible with analysis of traditionally sectioned coronal brain slices. In addition to SMART, we introduce a modified tissue clearing protocol based on the iDISCO+ procedure that is optimized for uniform Fos antibody labeling and tissue clearing across whole intact mouse brains. Here we demonstrate the utility of the SMART-WholeBrain pipeline, in conjunction with the modified iDISCO+ Fos procedure, by providing example datasets alongside a full user tutorial. Finally, we present a subset of these data online in an interactive web applet. The complete SMART package is available for download on GitHub.

Animal Models of (or for) Aggression Reward, Addiction, and Relapse: Behavior and Circuits

The Journal of Neuroscience. 2019 May 22;39(21):3996-4008. doi: 10.1523/JNEUROSCI.0151-19.2019.

Golden SA, Jin M, Shaham Y.

Inappropriate and pathological aggression plays a leading role in the suffering and death of millions of people, and further places an untenable strain on the caregivers and families of those afflicted. In some cases, such as addictive drugs, aggression can be highly rewarding (appetitive) and continually pursued despite short- and long-term negative consequences. Similarly, recidivism (relapse) rates for repeat violent offenders are as high as relapse rates for drug addicts. Appetitive aggression and relapse to aggression seeking can be modeled in mice studies using conditioned place preference and self-administration procedures followed by a period of abstinence and subsequent tests for relapse to aggression preference and aggression seeking. These procedures allow for the study of the mechanisms that control the appetitive versus the consummatory (attack) phases of aggressive behavior. In this review, we first discuss the behavioral procedures developed to probe appetitive aggression in mouse models, spanning from Pavlovian to operant tasks, and we also describe the recently proposed phenomenon of “aggression addiction.” Next, we discuss the pharmacological and circuit mechanisms of aggression conditioned place preference and aggression self-administration, seeking, and relapse, highlighting mechanistic congruence and divergence between appetitive and consummatory phases of aggression. We conclude by discussing clinical implications of the studies reviewed.

Nucleus Accumbens Drd1-Expressing Neurons Control Aggression Self-Administration and Aggression Seeking in Mice.

The Journal of Neuroscience. 2019 Mar 27;39(13):2482-2496. doi: 10.1523/JNEUROSCI.2409-18.2019.

Golden SA, Jin M, Heins C, Venniro M, Shaham Y.

We recently developed a mouse model of appetitive operant aggression and reported that adult male outbred CD-1 mice lever-press for the opportunity to attack subordinate male mice and relapse to aggression seeking during abstinence. Here we studied the role of nucleus accumbens (NAc) dopamine receptor (Drd)1- and Drd2-expressing neurons in aggression self-administration and aggression seeking. We trained CD-1 mice to self-administer intruders (9 d, 12 trials/d) and tested them for aggression self-administration and aggression seeking on abstinence Day 1. We used immunohistochemistry and in situ hybridization to measure the neuronal activity marker Fos in the NAc, and cell-type-specific colocalization of Fos with Drd1- and Drd2-expressing neurons. To test the causal role of Drd1- and Drd2-expressing neurons, we validated a transgenic hybrid breeding strategy crossing inbred Drd1-Cre and Drd2-Cre transgenic mice with outbred CD-1 mice and used cell-type-specific Cre-DREADD (hM4Di) to inhibit NAc Drd1- and Drd2-expressing neuron activity. We found that aggression self-administration and aggression seeking induced higher Fos expression in NAc shell than in core, that Fos colocalized with Drd1 and Drd2 in both subregions, and that chemogenetic inhibition of Drd1-, but not Drd2-, expressing neurons decreased aggression self-administration and aggression seeking. Results indicate a cell-type-specific role of Drd1-expressing neurons that is critical for both aggression self-administration and aggression seeking. Our study also validates a simple breeding strategy between outbred CD-1 mice and inbred C57-based Cre lines that can be used to study cell-type and circuit mechanisms of aggression reward and relapse.

Basal forebrain projections to the lateral habenula modulate aggression reward.

Nature. 2016 Jun 30;534(7609):688-92. doi: 10.1038/nature18601.

Golden SA, Heshmati M, Flanigan M, Christoffel DJ, Guise K, Pfau ML, Aleyasin H, Menard C, Zhang H, Hodes GE, Bregman D, Khibnik L, Tai J, Rebusi N, Krawitz B, Chaudhury D, Walsh JJ, Han MH, Shapiro ML, Russo SJ.

Maladaptive aggressive behaviour is associated with a number of neuropsychiatric disorders and is thought to result partly from the inappropriate activation of brain reward systems in response to aggressive or violent social stimuli. Nuclei within the ventromedial hypothalamus, extended amygdala and limbic circuits are known to encode initiation of aggression; however, little is known about the neural mechanisms that directly modulate the motivational component of aggressive behaviour. Here we established a mouse model to measure the valence of aggressive inter-male social interaction with a smaller subordinate intruder as reinforcement for the development of conditioned place preference (CPP). Aggressors develop a CPP, whereas non-aggressors develop a conditioned place aversion to the intruder-paired context. Furthermore, we identify a functional GABAergic projection from the basal forebrain (BF) to the lateral habenula (lHb) that bi-directionally controls the valence of aggressive interactions. Circuit-specific silencing of GABAergic BF-lHb terminals of aggressors with halorhodopsin (NpHR3.0) increases lHb neuronal firing and abolishes CPP to the intruder-paired context. Activation of GABAergic BF-lHb terminals of non-aggressors with channelrhodopsin (ChR2) decreases lHb neuronal firing and promotes CPP to the intruder-paired context. Finally, we show that altering inhibitory transmission at BF-lHb terminals does not control the initiation of aggressive behaviour. These results demonstrate that the BF-lHb circuit has a critical role in regulating the valence of inter-male aggressive behaviour and provide novel mechanistic insight into the neural circuits modulating aggression reward processing.

Excitatory transmission at thalamo-striatal synapses mediates susceptibility to social stress.

Nat Neurosci. 2015 Jul;18(7):962-4. doi: 10.1038/nn.4034.

Christoffel DJ*, Golden SA*, Walsh JJ, Guise KG, Heshmati M, Friedman AK, Dey A, Smith M, Rebusi N, Pfau M, Ables JL, Aleyasin H, Khibnik LA, Hodes GE, Ben-Dor GA, Deisseroth K, Shapiro ML, Malenka RC, Ibanez-Tallon I, Han MH, Russo SJ.

Postsynaptic remodeling of glutamatergic synapses on ventral striatum (vSTR) medium spiny neurons (MSNs) is critical for shaping stress responses. However, it is unclear which presynaptic inputs are involved. Susceptible mice exhibited increased synaptic strength at intralaminar thalamus (ILT), but not prefrontal cortex (PFC), inputs to vSTR MSNs following chronic social stress. Modulation of ILT-vSTR versus PFC-vSTR neuronal activity differentially regulated dendritic spine plasticity and social avoidance.

Epigenetic regulation of RAC1 induces synaptic remodeling in stress disorders and depression.

Nat Med. 2013 Mar;19(3):337-44. doi: 10.1038/nm.3090. 

Golden SA, Christoffel DJ, Heshmati M, Hodes GE, Magida J, Davis K, Cahill ME, Dias C, Ribeiro E, Ables JL, Kennedy PJ, Robison AJ, Gonzalez-Maeso J, Neve RL, Turecki G, Ghose S, Tamminga CA, Russo SJ.

Depression induces structural and functional synaptic plasticity in brain reward circuits, although the mechanisms promoting these changes and their relevance to behavioral outcomes are unknown. Transcriptional profiling of the nucleus accumbens (NAc) for Rho GTPase-related genes, which are known regulators of synaptic structure, revealed a sustained reduction in RAS-related C3 botulinum toxin substrate 1 (Rac1) expression after chronic social defeat stress. This was associated with a repressive chromatin state surrounding the proximal promoter of Rac1. Inhibition of class 1 histone deacetylases (HDACs) with MS-275 rescued both the decrease in Rac1 transcription after social defeat stress and depression-related behavior, such as social avoidance. We found a similar repressive chromatin state surrounding the RAC1 promoter in the NAc of subjects with depression, which corresponded with reduced RAC1 transcription. Viral-mediated reduction of Rac1 expression or inhibition of Rac1 activity in the NAc increases social defeat-induced social avoidance and anhedonia in mice. Chronic social defeat stress induces the formation of stubby excitatory spines through a Rac1-dependent mechanism involving the redistribution of synaptic cofilin, an actin-severing protein downstream of Rac1. Overexpression of constitutively active Rac1 in the NAc of mice after chronic social defeat stress reverses depression-related behaviors and prunes stubby spines. Taken together, our data identify epigenetic regulation of RAC1 in the NAc as a disease mechanism in depression and reveal a functional role for Rac1 in rodents in regulating stress-related behaviors.

Mechanisms of psychostimulant-induced structural plasticity.

Cold Spring Harb Perspect Med. 2012 Oct 1;2(10). pii: a011957. doi: 10.1101/cshperspect.a011957.

Golden SA, Russo SJ.

Psychostimulants robustly induce alterations in neuronal structural plasticity throughout brain reward circuits. However, despite our extensive understanding of how these circuits modulate motivated behavior, it is still unclear whether structural plasticity within these regions drives pathological behavioral responses in addiction. Although these structural changes have been subjected to an exhaustive phenomenological characterization, we still have a limited understanding of the molecular mechanisms regulating their induction and the functional relevance of such changes in mediating addiction-like behavior. Here we have highlighted the known molecular pathways and intracellular signaling cascades that regulate psychostimulant-induced changes in neuronal morphology and synaptic restructuring, and we discuss them in the larger context of addiction behavior.

A standardized protocol for repeated social defeat stress in mice.

Nat Protoc. 2011 Jul 21;6(8):1183-91. doi: 10.1038/nprot.2011.361

Golden SA, Covington HE 3rd, Berton O, Russo SJ.

A major impediment to novel drug development has been the paucity of animal models that accurately reflect symptoms of affective disorders. In animal models, prolonged social stress has proven to be useful in understanding the molecular mechanisms underlying affective-like disorders. When considering experimental approaches for studying depression, social defeat stress, in particular, has been shown to have excellent etiological, predictive, discriminative and face validity. Described here is a protocol whereby C57BL/6J mice that are repeatedly subjected to bouts of social defeat by a larger and aggressive CD-1 mouse results in the development of a clear depressive-like syndrome, characterized by enduring deficits in social interactions. Specifically, the protocol consists of three important stages, beginning with the selection of aggressive CD-1 mice, followed by agonistic social confrontations between the CD-1 and C57BL/6J mice, and concluding with the confirmation of social avoidance in subordinate C57BL/6J mice. The automated detection of social avoidance allows a marked increase in throughput, reproducibility and quantitative analysis. This protocol is highly adaptable, but in its most common form it requires 3-4 weeks for completion.