UC San Diego

Cocaine addiction is one of the leading causes of drug-related deaths and overdose in the United States, and there are currently no cheap and effective treatments for this disease. To combat this problem, it is necessary to study the underlying neuronal circuits and populations that underlie cocaine seeking behavior. Previous studies have demonstrated that the prefrontal cortex (PFC) becomes hypoexcitable following chronic compulsive drug seeking (Chen et. al. 2013), so we decided to see how the inputs and outputs of the prefrontal cortex are modulated following chronic cocaine seeking. To answer both of these questions, we first designed a novel head-fixed cocaine self-administration behavioral setup. This thesis utilizes this model to answer two main questions: 1) how are the inputs to the prefrontal cortex modulated following cocaine addiction? 2) How are the downstream targets of the prefrontal cortex, the neocortex, modulated following cocaine seeking behavior?