Topic: drinking

In the lateral hypothalamus (LH), distinct cell populations modulate innate behaviors. We investigated the role of neurotensin-expressing (Nts) neurons in the LH in balancing feeding, drinking, and social behavior across internal states.In vivo calcium imaging in freely behaving mice revealed distinct activity patterns of Nts-LH neurons associated with water and food stimuli. After prolonged food restriction, water responses were strongly enhanced, suggesting that Nts-LH neurons are involved in maintaining water intake during hunger pressure. Activation of Nts-LH neurons counteracted hunger pr

Motivated behaviors such as feeding, drinking, and social behaviors, and the ability to efficiently switch between them, are essential for survival. The lateral hypothalamus (LH) plays a central role in orchestrating motivated behaviors. As there is minimal local synaptic communication within the LH, long-range synaptic input is critical to LH neural computations. In particular, the medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC), which integrates complex information about the environment, projects to the LH. However, it is unknown when mPFC to LH projection neurons are active. In this study, we combine in vi