Taste-immunosuppression engram: Reinforcement and extinction

Niemi, Maj-Britt; Härting, Margarete; Kou, Wei; del Rey, Adriana; Besedovsky, Hugo O.; Schedlowski, Manfred; Pacheco-López, Gustavo

doi:10.1016/j.jneuroim.2007.05.016

« Previous Next »Journal of Neuroimmunology
Volume 188, Issue 1 , Pages 74-79, August 2007

Taste-immunosuppression engram: Reinforcement and extinction

Maj-Britt Niemi
- Chair of Psychology and Behavioral Immunobiology, Institute for Behavioral Sciences, ETH Zurich, 8092 Zurich, Switzerland
Margarete Härting
- Department of Medical Psychology, Medical Faculty, University of Duisburg-Essen, 45122 Essen, Germany
Wei Kou
- Department of Medical Psychology, Medical Faculty, University of Duisburg-Essen, 45122 Essen, Germany
Adriana del Rey
- Division of Immunophysiology, Institute of Physiology, Philipps University of Marburg, 35037 Marburg, Germany
Hugo O. Besedovsky
- Division of Immunophysiology, Institute of Physiology, Philipps University of Marburg, 35037 Marburg, Germany
Manfred Schedlowski
- Chair of Psychology and Behavioral Immunobiology, Institute for Behavioral Sciences, ETH Zurich, 8092 Zurich, Switzerland
- Department of Medical Psychology, Medical Faculty, University of Duisburg-Essen, 45122 Essen, Germany
Gustavo Pacheco-López
- Chair of Psychology and Behavioral Immunobiology, Institute for Behavioral Sciences, ETH Zurich, 8092 Zurich, Switzerland
- Department of Physiology, Biophysics and Neuroscience, CINVESTAV, 07360 Mexico-City, Mexico
- Corresponding author. ETH Zurich, Institute for Behavioral Sciences, Chair of Psychology and Behavioral Immunobiology, TUR B21.1, Turnerstrasse 1, CH-8092 Zürich, Switzerland. Tel.: +41 44 6324369; fax: +41 44 6321355.

Received 27 March 2007; received in revised form 22 May 2007; accepted 23 May 2007. published online 30 June 2007.

Abstract

Several Pavlovian conditioning paradigms have documented the brain's abilities to sense immune-derived signals or immune status, associate them with concurrently relevant extereoceptive stimuli, and reinstate such immune responses on demand. Specifically, the naturalistic relation of food ingestion with its possible immune consequences facilitates taste-immune associations. Here we demonstrate that the saccharin taste can be associated with the immunosuppressive agent cyclosporine A, and that such taste-immune associative learning is subject to reinforcement. Furthermore, once consolidated, this saccharin-immunosuppression engram is resistant to extinction when avoidance behavior is assessed. More importantly, the more this engram is activated, either at association or extinction phases, the more pronounced is the conditioned immunosuppression.

Keywords: Conditioning, Taste avoidance, Cyclosporine A, Extinction, Immunosuppression, Reinforcement