Topic: hypothalamic oxytocin neurons

Maternal motivation enables heightened responsivity of mothers towards offspring. While this motivational state is critical to infant survival, little is known about its regulation. Previous work in maternal rodents demonstrates that lesioning ventral tegmental area (VTA) neurons disrupts maternal motivated behaviors; and that these behaviors are restored by manipulating pup sensory salience (i.e., by increasing pup cries) and maternal states (Hansen 1994 Physiol Behav). Additionally, the neurohormone oxytocin is known to promote VTA-mediated maternal behaviors including infant approach and nu

Naturalistic behaviors in mammals are triggered by specific sensory cues and strongly influenced by internal states such as hormonal levels. Infant-oriented motor actions in maternal mice are enabled by sensory stimuli from the pups (such as vocalizations, somatic touch). Some maternal behaviors, like nursing and searching for isolated pups outside of the nest, further depend on the release of the hypothalamic neurohormone oxytocin (Menon & Neumann, 2023). However, pup stimuli are often aversive to virgin females (Lecca et al., 2023; Schiavo et al., 2020), who also exhibit different patter