Rats exhibit different patterns of neural activity in the dorsolateral and dorsomedial parts of the striatum while learning to navigate a maze. Dorsolateral striatal neurons are most active (red) when the rat performs specific actions like starting, turning, and stopping. Dorsomedial striatal neurons are most active when the rat is deciding which way to turn, but this activity declines over time as the rat masters the task.
CAMBRIDGE, Mass. Driving to and from work is a habit for most commuters ? we do it without really thinking. But before our commutes became routine, we had to learn our way through trial-and-error exploration. A new study out of MIT has found that there are two brain circuits involved with this kind of learning and that the patterns of activity in these circuits evolve as our behaviors become more habitual. The researchers focused on the basal ganglia, brain structures that are best known for their role in movement control, but which are also involved in emotion, cognition and reward-based learning. These different functions are thought to reside in different parts of basal ganglia. The dorsolateral part of the striatum (the input side of the basal ganglia) controls movement and is connected to the sensorimotor cortex, while the dorsomedial striatum controls flexible behavior and is connected to higher areas known as association cortex.
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