Chemogenetic and Optogenetic Activation of Gas Signaling in the Basolateral Amygdala Induces Acute and Social Anxiety-Like States

Anxiety disorders are debilitating psychiatric illnesses with detrimental effects on human health. These heightened states of arousal are often in the absence of obvious threatening cues and are difficult to treat owing to a lack of understanding of the neural circuitry and cellular machinery mediating these conditions. Activation of noradrenergic circuitry in the basolateral amygdala is thought to have a role in stress, fear, and anxiety, and the specific cell and receptor types responsible is an active area of investigation. Here we take advantage of two novel cellular approaches to dissect the contributions of G-protein signaling in acute and social anxiety-like states. We used a chemogenetic approach utilizing the Gas DREADD (rM3Ds) receptor and show that selective activation of generic Gas signaling is sufficient to induce acute and social anxiety-like behavioral states in mice. Second, we use a recently characterized chimeric receptor composed of rhodopsin and the beta(2)-adrenergic receptor (Opto-beta(2)AR) with in vivo optogenetic techniques to selectively activate Gas beta-adrenergic signaling exclusively within excitatory neurons of the basolateral amygdala. We found that optogenetic induction of beta-adrenergic signaling in the basolateral amygdala is sufficient to induce acute and social anxiety-like behavior. These findings support the conclusion that activation of Gas signaling in the basolateral amygdala has a role in anxiety. These data also suggest that acute and social anxiety-like states may be mediated through signaling pathways identical to beta-adrenergic receptors, thus providing support that inhibition of this system may be an effective anxiolytic therapy.