Dopaminergic and noradrenergic activity increases in response to salient environmental stimuli to mediate similar behavioral functions. However, mechanistic insight into such overlap is poorly understood. Recently, we demonstrated that phasic dopamine (DA) release in the nucleus accumbens (NAc) is modulated by adrenergic receptors in the VTA to facilitate stimulus-dependent behaviors. However, it remains to be demonstrated what kinds of stimuli induce noradrenergic modulation of VTA-NAc circuit. We aimed to determine which stimuli are able to evoke noradrenergic signaling in the VTA to modulate DA release in the NAc. We used fiber photometry to detect catecholamine release in anesthetized male Sprague-Dawley rats. We used virally-induced expression of red fluorescent DA (rDA) and GPCR-activation–based noradrenaline (GRABNE) sensors to selectively detect DA and noradrenaline (NA) in the VTA-NAc circuit. To drive noradrenergic activity we used electrical stimulation of locus coeruleus as well as electric foot shock; both stimuli with well-defined effects on NA release. Electrical stimulation of LC induced robust phasic NA, but modest DA release in the VTA. Conversely, such stimulation evoked significant phasic DA release with little NA signal in the NAc. Additionally, our preliminary results show that electric foot shock induced similar catecholaminergic activity in the VTA-NAc circuit with prominent phasic NA release in VTA and subsequent phasic DA release in NAc. Here, we demonstrate that LC neuronal activity leads to phasic NA release in the VTA and subsequent phasic DA release in the forebrain – an effect potentially mimicking mechanism of stressful stimuli.National Science Centre grant no: UMO-2020/39/B/NZ7/03537