Neurotensin orchestrates valence assignment in the amygdala – Wow, I missed this one somehow but… wow. Ultimately, this study is asserting that positive/negative valence assignment in the valence evaluation centers comes down to a single chemical. I assumed that the process was a bit more complex than this but that assumption was probably born out of the same “brains are too complex to understand” legacy that we’re trying to wean away from. Valence encoding is a single chemical. Wow. This implies the overwhelming function of valence centers must be creating maps rather than evaluation itself, and supports recent work which suggests the dorsal/ventral streams integrate most information in place. Even crazier, this is probably our first real “personality” gene!
Bush – The Chemicals Between Us
It’s bizarre to me that this isn’t being talked about more, it’s one of the fundamental pieces of brain magic decoded. It has to be more complicated than this right? This is so damn testable that I’m hopping in my seat thinking about the confirmation work over the next few months. I thought I had filters that caught everything coming out of Salk, how did I miss this?
Although it’s probably more accurate to say “initial valence assignment” rather than imply that this single chemical fully assigns valence as a whole, even in the same assessment organ. That initial valence assignment however holds a tremendous amount of weight.
The more I think about this study the more insane it is, especially when you consider the mechanics of neurotensin as essentially converting dopminergic salience channel signals to valence. This is probably the best full chain salience/valence model support work I’ve seen.
This also reinforces the importance of the hypothalamus developmentally.