Taste perception is important for animals to take adequate nutrients and avoid toxins for their survival. Appetitive and aversive behaviors are produced by value evaluation of taste and taste expectation caused by other sensations. The value evaluation, coupled with a cue presentation, produces outcome expectation and guides flexible behaviors when the environment is changed. Experimental studies demonstrated distinct functional roles of basolateral amygdala (ABL) and orbitofrontal cortex (OFC) in value evaluation and adaptive behavior. ABL is involved in generating a cue-outcome association, whereas OFC makes a contribution of generating a cue-triggered expectation to guide adaptive behavior. However, it remains unclear how ABL and OFC form their functional roles, with the learning of adaptive behavior. To address this issue, we focus on an odor discrimination task of rats and develop a computational model that consists of OFC and ABL, interacting with reward and decision systems. We present the neural mechanisms underlying the rapid formation of cue-outcome association in ABL and late behavioral adaptation mediated by OFC. Moreover, we offer 2 functions of cue-selective neurons in OFC: one is that the activation of cue-selective neurons transmits value information to decision area to guide behavior and another is that persistent activity of cue-selective neurons evokes a weak activity of taste-sensitive OFC neurons, leading to cue-outcome expectation. Our model further accounts for ABL and OFC responses caused by lesions of these areas. The results provide a computational framework of how ABL and OFC are functionally linked through their interactions with the reward and decision systems.

中文翻译：

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眶额皮层与杏仁核相互作用产生提示结果预期的神经机制。

味觉对于动物摄取足够的营养并避免毒素生存至关重要。食欲和厌恶行为是通过对味觉的价值评估和其他感觉引起的味觉预期产生的。当环境改变时，价值评估与提示的呈现相结合，可以产生预期的结果并指导灵活的行为。实验研究证明了基底外侧杏仁核（ABL）和眶额皮质（OFC）在价值评估和适应行为中的独特功能。ABL参与生成提示-结果关联，而OFC则通过生成提示触发的期望值来指导适应性行为。然而，目前尚不清楚随着学习适应性行为，ABL和OFC如何形成其功能角色。为了解决这个问题，我们专注于大鼠的气味识别任务，并开发了由OFC和ABL组成的计算模型，并与奖励和决策系统进行了交互。我们提出了潜在的ABL提示和结果关联的快速形成和由OFC介导的后期行为适应的神经机制。此外，我们在OFC中提供了提示选择神经元的2种功能：一种是提示选择性神经元的激活将价值信息传递到决策区域以指导行为，另一种是提示选择性神经元的持续活动引起了味觉的微弱活动。敏感的OFC神经元，导致提示结果预期。我们的模型进一步说明了由这些区域的病变引起的ABL和OFC反应。