Project description
Understanding the brain’s regulation mechanisms in stress and anxiety
When animals face threats, they display behaviours such as fleeing, along with physiological changes including increased heart rate and blood pressure. While we understand their behavioural responses, the neural mechanisms behind these physiological changes are not fully understood, and it is unclear how the brain coordinates both adaptations. The ERC-funded HypoAdapt project will explore the hypothalamus, particularly the dorsomedial hypothalamus (DMH), which regulates responses to homeostatic challenges. It aims to understand how inhibitory inputs to the DMH influence responses to stressors and the role of neuropeptides in stress modulation. The research will offer insights into the neural circuits involved in survival adaptations to threats, highlighting the brain’s regulation mechanisms related to stress and anxiety disorders.
Objective
When faced with threats to their survival, animals execute flexible behavioral adaptations specific to each threat, such as escaping a predator. These behaviors are accompanied by brain-driven physiological changes, including elevated heart rate, blood pressure and respiration, which are critical for meeting the increased energy demands during stress. While behavioral responses to threats have been extensively studied, the neural mechanisms that coordinate the accompanying physiological changes remain poorly understood. Additionally, it remains unclear how the brain orchestrates behavioral and physiological adaptations in tandem. HypoAdapt aims to bridge this knowledge gap by investigating the organization and function of the hypothalamus — a critical brain region responsible for both behavioral and physiological responses to homeostatic challenges. Specifically, we will focus on the dorsomedial hypothalamus (DMH) through the following aims. Aim 1: Decipher the anatomical and functional organization of the DMH circuitry that controls responses to distinct stressors. Aim 2: Define how inhibitory inputs to the DMH control the dynamic execution of behavioral and physiological responses with precise timing and vigor. Aim 3: Discover the role of neuropeptide inputs to the DMH in regulating stress state by modulating the underlying neural circuits. By employing cellular resolution neural imaging, machine-learning-based behavioral tracking, monitoring of physiology and neural circuit mapping and manipulations, HypoAdapt will be the first study to offer a holistic view of the neural circuit mechanisms underlying survival adaptations to threats. These findings will illuminate general principles underlying brain-controlled processes that require both rapid and long lasting regulation. Additionally, this research has the potential to inform about mechanisms underlying dysregulation of these behavioral and physiological adaptions in stress and anxiety disorders.
Fields of science (EuroSciVoc)
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CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
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Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Programme(s)
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Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
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HORIZON.1.1 - European Research Council (ERC)
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(opens in new window) ERC-2025-STG
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3400 Klosterneuburg
Austria
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