Cell

Behavioral state is known to influence interactions between thalamus and cortex, which are important for sensation, action, and cognition. The thalamic reticular nucleus (TRN) is hypothesized to regulate thalamo-cortical interactions, but the underlying functional architecture of this process and its state dependence are unknown. By combining the first TRN ensemble recording with psychophysics and connectivity-based optogenetic tagging, we found reticular circuits to be composed of distinct subnetworks. While activity of limbic-projecting TRN neurons positively correlates with arousal, sensory-projecting neurons participate in spindles and show elevated synchrony by slow waves during sleep. Sensory-projecting neurons are suppressed by attentional states, demonstrating that their gating of thalamo-cortical interactions is matched to behavioral state. Bidirectional manipulation of attentional performance was achieved through subnetwork-specific optogenetic stimulation. Together, our findings provide evidence for differential inhibition of thalamic nuclei across brain states, where the TRN separately controls external sensory and internal limbic processing facilitating normal cognitive function. PAPERFLICK:DP1 MH103908/MH/NIMH NIH HHS/United StatesDP1MH103908/DP/NCCDPHP CDC HHS/United StatesK99 NS 078115/NS/NINDS NIH HHS/United StatesK99 NS078115/NS/NINDS NIH HHS/United StatesR00 NS078115/NS/NINDS NIH HHS/United StatesR01 GM104948/GM/NIGMS NIH HHS/United StatesR01 MH061976/MH/NIMH NIH HHS/United StatesR01 NS077986/NS/NINDS NIH HHS/United StatesR01-MH061976/MH/NIMH NIH HHS/United StatesR01MH057414/MH/NIMH NIH HHS/United StatesR01MH101209/MH/NIMH NIH HHS/United StatesR01NS077986/NS/NINDS NIH HHS/United StatesTR01-GM10498/GM/NIGMS NIH HHS/United States2015-08-14T00:00:00Z25126786PMC420548