Two-way active avoidance (2WAA) involves learning Pavlovian (association of a sound cue with a foot shock) and instrumental (shock avoidance) contingencies. To identify regions where dopamine (DA) is involved in mediating 2WAA, we restored DA signaling in specific brain areas of dopamine-deficient (DD) mice by local reactivation of conditionally…

Combined activation of dopamine D1- and NMDA-glutamate receptors in the nucleus accumbens has been strongly implicated in instrumental learning, the process in which an individual learns that a specific action has a wanted outcome. To assess dopaminergic activity, we presented rats with two sessions (30 trials each) of a one-lever appetitive…

Describes how a behavioral system in Aplysia (marine snail) can be used to examine mechanisms of several forms of learning at different levels of analysis: behavioral, cell-physiological, ultrastructural, and molecular. Focusing on short-term sensitization, suggests how molecular mechanisms can be extended to explain long-term memory and classical…