@article{4429387db43a4b17a1f17c264239dec3,
title = "Touch neurons underlying dopaminergic pleasurable touch and sexual receptivity",
abstract = "Pleasurable touch is paramount during social behavior, including sexual encounters. However, the identity and precise role of sensory neurons that transduce sexual touch remain unknown. A population of sensory neurons labeled by developmental expression of the G protein-coupled receptor Mrgprb4 detects mechanical stimulation in mice. Here, we study the social relevance of Mrgprb4-lineage neurons and reveal that these neurons are required for sexual receptivity and sufficient to induce dopamine release in the brain. Even in social isolation, optogenetic stimulation of Mrgprb4-lineage neurons through the back skin is sufficient to induce a conditioned place preference and a striking dorsiflexion resembling the lordotic copulatory posture. In the absence of Mrgprb4-lineage neurons, female mice no longer find male mounts rewarding: sexual receptivity is supplanted by aggression and a coincident decline in dopamine release in the nucleus accumbens. Together, these findings establish that Mrgprb4-lineage neurons initiate a skin-to-brain circuit encoding the rewarding quality of social touch.",
keywords = "peripheral optogenetics, pleasure, reward pathway, spinal cord, touch",
author = "Elias, {Leah J.} and Succi, {Isabella K.} and Schaffler, {Melanie D.} and William Foster and Gradwell, {Mark A.} and Manon Bohic and Akira Fushiki and Aman Upadhyay and Ejoh, {Lindsay L.} and Ryan Schwark and Rachel Frazer and Brittany Bistis and Burke, {Jessica E.} and Victoria Saltz and Boyce, {Jared E.} and Anissa Jhumka and Costa, {Rui M.} and Abraira, {Victoria E.} and Ishmail Abdus-Saboor",
note = "Funding Information: We thank members of the Abdus-Saboor, Costa, and Abraira labs for their helpful discussion and comments on this manuscript. We thank Oliver Hobert, Richard Axel, and Charles Zuker for their helpful comments on this work and manuscript. We thank Nitsan Goldstein and members of the Betley lab for assistance with the fiber photometry setup. We thank David Barker for suggestions with the pMAT software. We thank members of L.J.E.{\textquoteright}s thesis committee, especially Lori Flannagan-Cato, for helpful suggestions on experiments and Greg Corder for providing space for revisions experiments. We thank Qin Liu for sharing Mrgprb4 Cre ; Rosa ChR2/ChR2 mice with us and Wenqin Luo. We thank David Ng and the Zuckerman Mind Brain Behavior Institute molecular virology core for generating ChRmine viruses for this study. We thank Gabriela Martins and Helio Rodrigues for assistance with setting up an Inscopix microendoscopy rig. We thank Janet Sinn-Hanlon for the illustrations. We thank the Marlin lab for sharing an anti-HA antibody. We thank Darcy Peterka for sharing an orange laser with us. L.J.E. and M.D.S. were supported by NIH NRSA grants from NINDS and NCCIH . A.F. is supported by a NARSAD Young Investigator Grant from the Brain & Behavior Research Foundation . I.A.-S. and lab members acknowledge support from startup funds provided by the University of Pennsylvania and Columbia University , National Institute of Health grants K99/R00 and DP2 New Innovator , and fellowships from the Rita Allen Foundation , Pew Charitable Trust , Brain Research Foundation , Chan Zuckerberg Initiative , and Alfred P. Sloan Foundation . V.E.A., M.B., and M.A.G. acknowledge support from startup funds from Rutgers University , Pew Charitable Trust , NIH R01 and K01 grants from NINDS , and Whitehall Foundation . Publisher Copyright: {\textcopyright} 2022 The Author(s)",
year = "2023",
month = feb,
day = "2",
doi = "https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cell.2022.12.034",
language = "English (US)",
volume = "186",
pages = "577--590.e16",
journal = "Cell",
issn = "0092-8674",
publisher = "Cell Press",
number = "3",
}