Vagus Nerve Stimulation Enhances Extinction of Conditioned Fear in Rats and Modulates Arc Protein, CaMKII, and GluN2B-Containing NMDA Receptors in the Basolateral Amygdala

Figure 1

Increased expression of p-CaMKII and decreased expression of Arc protein in the BLA of animals given VNS during extinction training. (a) Timeline of behavioral protocol. On days 1 and 2 rats were subjected to auditory fear conditioning (AFC) followed by a conditioned fear response test (CFRT) on day 3. On day 4 rats underwent extinction training (EXT) and were sacrificed 45 min later. (b) Rats given VNS during extinction training show higher levels of p-CaMKII compared to rats given sham stimulation (). (c, d) No significance difference in expression of CaMKIIα or CaMKIIβ across groups. (e) VNS-treated rats show lower levels of Arc protein expression compared to sham-treated rats (). (f) No difference in p-PKA expression across groups.

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