Functional differences between the prelimbic and anterior cingulate regions of the rat prefrontal cortex.

Abstract

The effects of reversible lidocaine-induced lesions of 2 subregions of the rat medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) were examined on a series of cognitively based foraging behaviors on a radial-arm maze. Lesions of the prelimbic (PL) or anterior cingulate (AC) cortex prior to the retention phase of a delayed-foraging task disrupted performance differentially; rats with PL lesions visited arms in a random manner, whereas rats with AC lesions revisited previously baited arms preferentially. Rats with AC lesions were also impaired on a single-trial foraging task; they made numerous revisits to previously baited arms. PL lesions had no effect on performance of this task in well-trained rats. However, rats trained on the 2-phase task did not adapt to a new foraging strategy after a PL lesions, when they were switched unexpectedly to the single-trial foraging task. These data demonstrate functional heterogeneity within the rat mPFC and suggest that the PL is involved in processes through which recently acquired information is used to organize and modify foraging behavior, whereas the AC may play an important role in response flexibility.

Excitotoxic Lesions of the Rat Medial Prefrontal Cortex Effects on Abnormal Behaviors Associated with Neonatal Hippocampal Damage

“…19, NO. 6 accumbens (dorsal PL (Cg3), ACd (Cg1), and PrCm (F2) projecting to the core, IL to the shell of the n. accumbens (Brog et al 1993), as well as different functions (Seamans et al 1995) than the IL/PL (Cg3) regions. Second, a neonatal lesion may allow more sparing or recovery of function than a similar adult lesion.…”

D1 and D2 Receptor Antagonist Injections in the Prefrontal Cortex Selectively Impair Spatial Learning in Mice

“…Furthermore, in rats, lesions of the PFC have been shown to disrupt performance in the delayed spatial win-shift version of the radial-arm maze task (Seamans et al, 1995;Floresco et al, 1997), in the Morris water maze task (Sutherland et al, 1982;Kolb, 1984) and in the delayed spatial alternation task (de Brabander et al, 1991;Sanchez-Santed et al, 1997). It should be mentioned, however, that the literature is not always consistent in demonstrating impairments after prefrontal cortical lesions.…”

“…The involvement of the PFC in spatial learning has been demonstrated in lesion studies using the Morris water maze (Sutherland et al, 1982;Kolb, 1984), the radial arm maze (Seamans et al, 1995;Floresco et al, 1997) and the object displacement in the open field (Sargolini et al, 1999). It should be noted, however, that the literature is not always consistent in indicating a role for this structure in spatial information processing (Poucet, 1989;de Bruin et al, 1994de Bruin et al, , 2001Delatour and Gisquet-Verrier, 1996;Granon et al, 1996;Lacroix et al, 2002).…”

“…We chose to study the prelimbic (PL) region of the PFC based on previous behavioral and anatomical data, showing that the PL cortex is involved in spatial learning (Brito and Brito, 1990;Seamans et al, 1995Seamans et al, , 1998Sargolini et al, 1999). Moreover the PL is the prefrontal terminal area that receives the most dense glutamatergic projection from the hippocampus (Jay and Witter, 1991;Carr and Sesack, 1996) and dopaminergic projections from the VTA (Lindvall et al, 1974;Van Eden et al, 1987).…”

Anticipatory activity in rat medial prefrontal cortex during a working memory task

“…The mPFC in rat consists of four main subdivisions, the medial agranular, anterior cingulate (AC), prelimbic (PL) and infralimbic cortices [10][11][12] . inactivation of the ventral mPFC (PL and AC cortices), produces marked deficits in delayedresponse tasks involving short or long delays [13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20] . Recent evidence indicates that the PL cortex is directly involved in limbic/cognitive functions, homologous to the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) in primates [21] , which is necessary for delayed-response tasks [2,22] .…”