TY - JOUR T1 - More than a feeling: central amygdala mediates social transfer of information about proximity of danger JF - bioRxiv DO - 10.1101/2020.02.28.969113 SP - 2020.02.28.969113 AU - K. Andraka AU - K. Kondrakiewicz AU - K. Rojek-Sito AU - K. Ziegart-Sadowska AU - K. Meyza AU - T. Nikolaev AU - A. Hamed AU - M. Kursa AU - M. Wójcik AU - K. Danielewski AU - M. Wiatrowska AU - E. Kublik AU - M. Bekisz AU - T. Lebitko AU - D. Duque AU - T. Jaworski AU - H. Madej AU - W. Konopka AU - P. M. Boguszewski AU - E. Knapska Y1 - 2020/01/01 UR - http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2020/03/06/2020.02.28.969113.abstract N2 - To survive, an animal must adequately respond to challenges presented by the environment. Social animals can learn about danger from fear of conspecifics which allows them to avoid predation and other threats without costly, first-hand experience. However, it remains unclear as to whether animals can transmit specific information that helps an individual avoid harm or whether the transmitted social signals simply increase vigilance in a non-specific manner. Here we demonstrate that animals can select appropriate defensive strategies in a novel environment depending on cues from the conspecific and, using opsins targeted to behaviorally activated neurons, identify distinct neuronal circuits in the central amygdala (CeA) that are crucial for choosing a context-appropriate reaction. The identified circuits differ in molecular markers and patterns of connectivity. Thus, we show that social signals carry explicit information about proximity of danger, necessary for choosing a context-appropriate reaction, and that the choosing process is mediated by the CeA circuits. ER -