clm-5z80a358n0

VTA (Ventral tegmental area) projects to ACB (Nucleus accumbens)

Species: Mouse
Result: present
Method: retrograde tracer
Sign: modulatory
Evidence: Retrograde AAV encoding tdTomato (AAVrg-CAG-tdTomato in wild-type mice, AAVrg-FLEX-tdTomato in TH-BAC-Cre mice) injected into the nucleus accumbens retrogradely labelled VTA neurons, including dopaminergic ones. When combined with a differently coloured retrograde tracer in the BLA, only about 2.7% of 2100 labelled VTA neurons carried both labels, indicating largely segregated VTA→NAc and VTA→BLA populations.
Source: Midbrain projection to the basolateral amygdala encodes anxiety-like but not depression-like behaviors
Nature Communications, 2022
DOI 10.1038/s41467-022-29155-1 · PubMed 35318315 · PMC8940900, Supplementary Fig. 3a, b; Results (VTA → BLA dopamine neuron hypoactivity section)
Licence: CC-BY-4.0
Named in the paper: “VTA” and “NAc”
Made by: an AI model reading the paper (claude-opus-5, extract@0.3.0), 2026-10-09
Checked by: a second AI model (claude-opus-5) agrees, 2026-10-09
“Retrograde AAV-tdTomato in NAc labelled VTA neurons in mice, with the 2.7%/2100 dual-labelling figure matching the paper, and dopaminergic identity supports a modulatory sign.”
Status: proposed
Drafted and checked by AI models; it stays proposed until people have audited a sample of such claims.