title: The Histaminergic Tuberomamillary Nucleus Is Involved in Appetite for Sex, Water and Amphetamine.
abstract: The histaminergic system is one component of the ascending arousal system which is involved in wakefulness, neuroendocrine control, cognition, psychiatric disorders and motivation. During the appetitive phase of motivated behaviors the arousal state rises to an optimal level, thus giving proper intensity to the behavior. Previous studies have demonstrated that the histaminergic neurons show an earlier activation during the appetitive phase of feeding, compared to other ascending arousal system nuclei, paralleled with a high increase in arousal state. Lesions restricted to the histaminergic neurons in rats reduced their motivation to get food even after 24 h of food deprivation, compared with intact or sham lesioned rats. Taken together, these findings indicate that the histaminergic system is important for appetitive behavior related to feeding. However, its role in other goal-directed behaviors remains unexplored. In the present work, male rats rendered motivated to obtain water, sex, or amphetamine showed an increase in Fos-ir of histaminergic neurons in appetitive behaviors directed to get those reinforcers. However, during appetitive tests to obtain sex, or drug in amphetamine-conditioned rats, Fos expression increased in most other ascending arousal system nuclei, including the orexin neurons in the lateral hypothalamus, dorsal raphe, locus coeruleus and laterodorsal tegmental neurons, but not in the ventral tegmental area, which showed no Fos-ir increase in any of the 3 conditions. Importantly, all these appetitive behaviors were drastically reduced after histaminergic cell-specific lesion, suggesting a critical contribution of histamine on the intensity component of several appetitive behaviors.
authors: Departamento de Ciencias Fisiológicas, Facultad de Ciencias Biológicas, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, Alameda 340, Santiago, Chile.
authors: Marco
authors: M
authors: Contreras
authors: Departamento de Ciencias Fisiológicas, Facultad de Ciencias Biológicas, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, Alameda 340, Santiago, Chile.|Centro de Fisiología Celular Integrativa, Facultad de Medicina, Clínica Alemana Universidad del Desarrollo. Santiago, Chile.
authors: María E
authors: ME
authors: Riveros
authors: Departamento de Ciencias Fisiológicas, Facultad de Ciencias Biológicas, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, Alameda 340, Santiago, Chile.
authors: Maricel
authors: M
authors: Quispe
authors: Programa disciplinario de Fisiología y Biofísica, Biomedical Neuroscience Institute, BNI, I.C.B.M., Facultad de Medicina, Universidad de Chile, Independencia 1027, Santiago, Chile.
authors: Cristián
authors: C
authors: Sánchez
authors: Departamento de Ciencias Fisiológicas, Facultad de Ciencias Biológicas, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, Alameda 340, Santiago, Chile.
authors: Guayec
authors: G
authors: Perdomo
authors: Departamento de Ciencias Fisiológicas, Facultad de Ciencias Biológicas, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, Alameda 340, Santiago, Chile.
authors: Fernando
authors: F
authors: Torrealba
authors: Programa disciplinario de Fisiología y Biofísica, Biomedical Neuroscience Institute, BNI, I.C.B.M., Facultad de Medicina, Universidad de Chile, Independencia 1027, Santiago, Chile.
authors: José L
authors: JL
authors: Valdés
mesh_terms: D000661:Amphetamine; D000818:Animals; D001066:Appetite; D001070:Appetitive Behavior; D005260:Female; D007026:Hypothalamic Area, Lateral / Q000473:pathology / Q000502:physiology*; D008297:Male; D009474:Neurons / Q000378:metabolism; D016760:Proto-Oncogene Proteins c-fos / Q000378:metabolism; D051381:Rats; D012726:Sexual Behavior, Animal
chemical_list: D016760:Proto-Oncogene Proteins c-fos; D000661:Amphetamine