Stimulus-specific enhancement of fear extinction during slow-wave sleep

Katherina K. Hauner*, James D. Howard, Christina Zelano, Jay A. Gottfried

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

146 Scopus citations

Abstract

Sleep can strengthen memory for emotional information, but whether emotional memories can be specifically targeted and modified during sleep is unknown. In human subjects who underwent olfactory contextual fear conditioning, re-exposure to the odorant context in slow-wave sleep promoted stimulus-specific fear extinction, with parallel reductions of hippocampal activity and reorganization of amygdala ensemble patterns. Thus, fear extinction may be selectively enhanced during sleep, even without re-exposure to the feared stimulus itself.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Pages (from-to)1553-1555
Number of pages3
JournalNature neuroscience
Volume16
Issue number11
DOIs
StatePublished - Nov 2013

Funding

We thank P. Zee, C. Westerberg and K.N. Wu for technical assistance, and J. Radulovic and K. Paller for insightful discussions. Support was provided from the US National Institutes of Health to K.K.H. (F32MH091967, T32NS047987) and to J.A.G. (R01DC010014, R21DC012014), and from the Northwestern University Center for Translational Imaging.

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • General Neuroscience

Fingerprint

Dive into the research topics of 'Stimulus-specific enhancement of fear extinction during slow-wave sleep'. Together they form a unique fingerprint.

Cite this