Abstract
As stressful environment is a potent modulator of feeding, we seek in the present work to decipher the neuroanatomical basis for an interplay between stress and feeding behaviors. For this, we combined anterograde and retrograde tracing with immunohistochemical approaches to investigate the patterns of projections between the dorsomedial division of the bed nucleus of the stria terminalis (BNST), well connected to the amygdala, and hypothalamic structures such as the paraventricular (PVH) and dorsomedial (DMH), the arcuate (ARH) nuclei and the lateral hypothalamic areas (LHA) known to control feeding and motivated behaviors. We particularly focused our study on afferences to proopiomelanocortin (POMC), agouti‐related peptide (AgRP), melanin‐concentrating‐hormone (MCH) and orexin (ORX) neurons characteristics of the ARH and the LHA, respectively. We found light to intense innervation of all these hypothalamic nuclei. We particularly showed an innervation of POMC, AgRP, MCH and ORX neurons by the dorsomedial and dorsolateral divisions of the BNST. Therefore, these results lay the foundation for a better understanding of the neuroanatomical basis of the stress‐related feeding behaviors.
Highlights
The prevalence of obesity reached an alarming rate over the last decades
We provided a deeper insight on the innervation of specific neuronal populations within these structures including melanin-concentrating hormone (MCH), ORX, POMC and Agouti Related Peptide (AgRP) neurons
Our study reveals that projections from the dorsomedial division of the bed nucleus of the stria terminalis (BNST) are connected to hypothalamic nuclei somehow linked to motivation and feeding behaviors such as the PVH (Atasoy et al, 2012; Betley et al, 2013; Hill, 2012), the dorsomedial nucleus of the hypothalamus (DMH) (Engström et al, 2020; Garfield et al, 2016; Jeong et al, 2017; Liao et al, 2019; Ryan et al, 2013), the lateral hypothalamic area (LHA) (Giardino et al, 2018; González et al, 2016; Jennings et al, 2013; Stuber & Wise, 2016) and the ARH (Timper & Brüning, 2017; van der Klaauw & Farooqi, 2015) (Figure 18)
Summary
The prevalence of obesity reached an alarming rate over the last decades. Obesity is a complex and multifactorial disease sensitive to environmental cues. We focused our study on the projections from the dorsomedial division of the BNST on neurons of hypothalamic nuclei involved in feeding and motivated behaviors: the PVH, the dorsomedial nucleus of the hypothalamus (DMH), the ARH and the LHA with a particular interest on POMC, AgRP/NPY, MCH, and ORX neurons. The chicken polyclonal GFP antibody (Invitrogen, Cat# A10262, RRID: AB_2534023) was produced by using GFP of jellyfish Aequorea Victoria as immunogen It was used in several species (Dog, Pig, Fruit fly, Zebrafish, Human, Mouse). Brains from Pomc-Cre and AgRP-IRES-Cre mice were cut in eight series of 30 μm thick coronal sections using a cryostat and collected on Superfrost PLUS slides They were stored at −20C until further procedures. Nomenclature and nuclear parcellation are based on Mouse Brain Atlas from Franklin and Paxinos (Franklin & Paxinos, 2008), on Rat Brain Atlas from Swanson (Swanson, 2004) and on other studies summarized in Giardino et al, 2018 (Figure 1a)
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