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Behavioural neuroscience

The circuit of fear

Nature volume 454, pages 589–590 (2008)Cite this article

Do you find it difficult to overcome an irrational fear? Blame it on the specific neural circuits hardwired in the brain that control fear recognition, and fear renewal even when fear has seemingly been overcome.

Learning to predict danger allows animals to defend themselves against harm and is crucial for survival. The neural mechanisms that subserve these functions are evolutionarily old, and their dysfunction is thought to underlie a host of anxiety disorders in humans, including post-traumatic stress and panic disorder1. Two papers in this issue, by Herry et al.2 (page 600) and Likhtik et al.3 (page 642), pinpoint the neural circuits that mediate the bidirectional transition between a defensive behaviour — fear — and the default exploratory behaviour.

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Figure 1: Neural circuits that mediate fear.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Pankaj Sah is at the Queensland Brain Institute, University of Queensland, St Lucia, Queensland 4072, Australia. pankaj.sah@uq.edu.au ,

    Pankaj Sah

  2. R. Frederick Westbrook is in the School of Psychology, University of New South Wales, Sydney, New South Wales 2052, Australia.,

    R. Frederick Westbrook

Authors
  1. Pankaj Sah
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  2. R. Frederick Westbrook
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Sah, P., Westbrook, R. The circuit of fear. Nature 454, 589–590 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1038/454589a

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