In a study published this month in Science Advances, Niu M, Kasai A et al discovered a small group of brain cells in the claustrum of mice that controls stress-induced anxiety behaviors.
　The researchers used well-established psychological animal models of restraint and social defeat stress to map patterns of cellular activity in mice that were exposed to stress. The team collected whole-brain images of control mice and mice exposed to these stressful conditions. Of the 22 brain regions studied, the claustrum was identified as a key region that differentiated stressed brains from non-stressed brains. Crucially, by manipulating the activity of these cells using chemogenetic technology, they concluded that the claustrum is crucial for the control of stress-induced anxiety-related behaviors. When these cells were activated using chemogenetic technology, mice exhibited anxiety-related behaviors, whereas deactivation of the cells made mice more resilient against chronic stress.
The article, “Claustrum mediates bidirectional and reversible control of stress-induced anxiety responses,” was published in Science Advances.