# Investigating Ventral CA1 Neural Representations of Anxiety-Like Behavior

> **NIH NIH F30** · COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY HEALTH SCIENCES · 2021 · $46,521

## Abstract

PROJECT SUMMARY
The ability to detect and appropriately respond to potentially threatening situations is critical for survival.
Dysregulation of the neural systems which mediate these functions can lead to pathological avoidance of
ordinary environments and persistent feelings of imminent threat, key components of the negative emotional
state characteristic of anxiety disorders. Many studies have begun to reveal the brain regions and neural
circuits that control avoidance behavior and encode states of anxiety. Specifically, the ventral hippocampus
has emerged as a critical node for emotional behaviors including those evoked by anxiogenic environments.
Our lab and others have found that subpopulations of single neurons in ventral CA1 are activated by aversive
environments, but this selectivity does not generalize across different tasks used to assay anxiety-like
behavior. Moreover, it is unclear which inputs to the ventral hippocampus provide the emotional information
that drives this anxiety-related neural activity. The mechanism by which the ventral hippocampus encodes
anxiety states is still unknown and investigating how this brain region represents these emotional states is an
essential step towards understanding the neural substrates of anxiety disorders. In this proposal, I will utilize
pose estimation algorithms and unsupervised behavioral segmentation (Aim 1), in vivo calcium imaging and
neural population analyses (Aim 2), along with simultaneous input-specific optogenetic inhibition and calcium
imaging (Aim 3) to characterize the behavioral manifestations of anxiety-like emotional states and determine
how they are encoded in the ventral hippocampus. Successful completion of this study will help to elucidate the
role of the ventral hippocampus in anxiety, potentially opening new research avenues for the development of
neural circuit based therapeutics to treat anxiety disorders. These data along with the research and scientific
expertise developed through this Kirschstein-NRSA F30 Fellowship Award will support my long-term goal of
becoming an independent physician-scientist.

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10214462
- **Project number:** 5F30MH124424-02
- **Recipient organization:** COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY HEALTH SCIENCES
- **Principal Investigator:** Sean Chih-Hsiung Lim
- **Activity code:** F30 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2021
- **Award amount:** $46,521
- **Award type:** 5
- **Project period:** 2020-07-01 → 2024-06-30

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10214462

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10214462, Investigating Ventral CA1 Neural Representations of Anxiety-Like Behavior (5F30MH124424-02). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-23 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10214462. Licensed CC0.

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