Subregion specific dynamics of striatal dopamine

Transient increases in dopamine within the striatum can encode reward prediction errors, critical signals for updating predictions of future rewards. However, it is unclear how this mechanism can provide suitable feedback for predictions across a wide range of time horizons: from seconds or less (if singing a song) to potentially hours or more (if hunting for food). Here we report that dopamine transients in distinct striatal subregions convey prediction errors over distinct time scales. Dopamine dynamics systematically accelerated from ventral to dorsal- medial to dorsal-lateral striatum, in the tempo of their spontaneous fluctuations, their temporal integration of prior rewards, and their discounting of future rewards. This spectrum of time scales for evaluative computations can help achieve efficient learning and adaptive motivation for a wide range of behaviors.