Seminar – Vincent Breton-Provencher

Venue: Centre Broca

Vincent Breton-Provencher
https://vbplab.com/

Invited by Etienne Coutureau (INCIA)

Title

Dopaminergic and noradrenergic codes for reinforcement processing during learning

Summary

Reinforcement learning relies on the brain’s ability to detect, evaluate, and respond to behaviourally relevant stimuli. This talk examines how two key neuromodulatory systems, dopamine and noradrenaline, contribute to this process. In the first part, we show that dopamine does not simply signal reward prediction error, but encodes a mixture of sensory intensity and outcome evaluation across anatomically distinct target regions. Using simultaneous fiber photometry recordings across the mPFC, BLA, NAc lateral shell, and dorsal striatum, we reveal that striatal regions prioritize outcome valuation, while cortical and amygdalar regions are more sensitive to sensory salience, suggesting a distributed and specialized dopaminergic code for reinforcement. In the second part, we turn to noradrenaline and its role in gating cortical circuits during learning. We find that α1A adrenergic receptors, concentrated in NDNF interneurons of motor cortex layer 1, normally stabilize the circuit by dampening NDNF activity. Selective knockout of these receptors renders NDNF neurons hyperresponsive to movement and reward, and disrupts the acquisition of cue-action-reward associations.These results suggest that noradrenaline, acting through α1A receptors in layer 1, gates the cortical circuit dynamics necessary for associative learning. Together, these findings position dopamine and noradrenaline as complementary neuromodulatory systems that encode and gate reinforcement signals across distributed brain circuits to support learning.

Publications

Bouchard, S.J., Boutin, J., Lévesque, M., Breton-Provencher, V. (2025) System-wide dissociation of reward and aversive dopaminergic signals. bioRxiv 2025.05. 27.656467

Breton-Provencher, V., Drummond G.T., Feng, J., Li, Y., Sur, M. (2022) Spatiotemporal dynamics of noradrenaline during learned behaviour. Nature 606 (7915), 732-738

Breton-Provencher, V., Sur, M. (2019) Active control of arousal by a locus coeruleus GABAergic circuit. Nature Neuroscience 29 (48), 15245-15257

• Lieu
  Centre Broca
  
• Dates
  Le 22 mai 2026 à 14:00