# Investigating the Role of the Retrosplenial Cortex in Multi-step Planning

> **NIH NIH F99** · BOSTON UNIVERSITY MEDICAL CAMPUS · 2022 · $47,752

## Abstract

PROJECT SUMMARY/ABSTRACT
Multi-step planning is a fundamental basis of human cognition and its impairment in disorders like schizophrenia
disrupts goal-directed behavior in everyday situations. Essential to planning is the evaluation of alternative
actions based on an internal model of the environment, but the exact neural implementation of this process is
poorly understood. Several lines of evidence have implicated the retrosplenial cortex (RSC) in memory,
prospection, and action evaluation, which makes the RSC the candidate region where model-based evaluation
is most likely performed to support planning. However, the role of RSC in multi-step planning has never directly
been tested. This project will address this gap by integrating cellular-resolution calcium imaging and
chemogenetic perturbation to monitor and silence the activity of RSC neurons in rats performing a two-step task
that elicits planning. By using this strategy, we will directly assess whether the activity of neurons in the RSC (1)
encodes the model-based value of future actions and (2) causally contributes to planning behavior during the
two-step task - two key evidence that can directly determine RSC’s role in multi-step planning. The identification
of neuronal responses supporting multi-step planning will advance our basic understanding of the
neurocomputational processes underlying cognition and inform direct translational research on the disruption of
flexible behavior among psychiatric patients. The aims of this project resonate with the mission of the BRAIN
Initiative in integrating innovative experimental and computational technologies to understand the neural
mechanisms of multi-step planning and goal-directed behavior, with potentials for guiding the diagnosis and
therapeutic intervention of related psychiatric disorders.

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10610630
- **Project number:** 1F99NS130925-01
- **Recipient organization:** BOSTON UNIVERSITY MEDICAL CAMPUS
- **Principal Investigator:** Rifqi Oklano Affan
- **Activity code:** F99 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2022
- **Award amount:** $47,752
- **Award type:** 1
- **Project period:** 2022-09-15 → 2024-08-31

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10610630

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10610630, Investigating the Role of the Retrosplenial Cortex in Multi-step Planning (1F99NS130925-01). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-06-23 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10610630. Licensed CC0.

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