Claire E. Stelly

Top-down control of flight by a non-canonical cortico-amygdala pathway.

The paper identifies a non-canonical cortico-amygdala pathway from the dorsal peduncular prefrontal cortex to the central amygdala that regulates high-intensity defensive behaviors like flight.

The role of genetically distinct central amygdala neurons in appetitive and aversive responding assayed with a novel dual valence operant conditioning paradigm.

This paper develops a dual valence operant conditioning paradigm to study appetitive and aversive behaviors in mice and tests the role of central amygdala neurons in these responses.

Critical periods when dopamine controls behavioral responding during Pavlovian learning

This study shows that dopamine receptor antagonism affects Pavlovian learning differently depending on training phase and task type, with persistent deficits only in reward size tasks during the expression phase.

Dopamine release and its control over early Pavlovian learning differs between the NAc core and medial NAc shell

This study examines dopamine release and its role in early Pavlovian learning in the NAc core and medial NAc shell, finding regional differences in dopamine responses and behavioral control.

Acute stress enhances associative learning via dopamine signaling in the ventral lateral striatum

This study shows acute stress enhances appetitive learning by increasing dopamine release in the ventral lateral striatum, which is blocked by dopamine receptor antagonists.