Stress regulation of sustained attention and the cholinergic attention system

Results: VS impaired attentional performance in SAT and increased the dendritic complexity of NBM cholinergic neurons in both sexes. NBM cholinergic neurons are mainly under inhibitory control, so this morphological change could increase inhibition on these neurons, reducing downstream ACh release to impair attention. Indeed, VS decreased ACh release in the prefrontal cortex of males. Quantification of global transcriptional changes revealed that, although VS induced many sex-specific changes in gene expression, it increased several signaling molecules in both sexes.