A Hippocampus-Accumbens Tripartite Neuronal Motif Guides Appetitive Memory in Space (Cell)

Retrieving and acting on memories of food-predicting environments are fundamental processes for animal survival. Trouche et al. show in mice that the behavioral manifestation of spatial appetitive memory requires a direct neural pathway from dorsal hippocampus to nucleus accumbens. This pathway engages dCA1 with a select population of accumbens parvalbumin-expressing fast-spiking interneurons, thereby sculpting the assembly activity of its postsynaptic medium-sized spiny neurons. An indirect pathway through dorsal subiculum is dispensable for appetitive memory but contributes to spatial novelty detection.