Distinct representations of an anxiogenic environment in different cell types of the ventral hippocampus

Ventral dentate gyrus granule cells and ventral CA1 neurons in mice show anxiety-related, arm-type specific valence encoding on the elevated plus maze, with ventral mossy cells encoding less valence.

• Why it matters: It is unclear how threat-related information is computed across the ventral hippocampal circuit, despite evidence that ventral CA1 neurons encode anxiety-related signals.
• What they did: The study imaged calcium activity in large populations of genetically defined neurons in ventral CA1 and ventral dentate gyrus while mice explored the elevated plus maze, comparing vDG granule cells with vDG mossy cells and vCA1 neurons.
• The result: vDG granule cells represented similar valence information to vCA1 via arm-type specific encoding, while vDG mossy cells showed stronger spatial encoding and less valence encoding, implying early emergence of anxiety-related features and distinct cell-type roles.

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