LSD degrades hippocampal spatial representations and suppresses hippocampal-visual cortical interactions
Cell Reports September 17, 2021 Carli Domenico, Daniel Haggerty, Xiang Mou et al. 16 citations
Lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD) reduces firing rates, directionality, and interaction with visual cortical neurons in hippocampal place cells of rats running along a familiar track. During head-twitching—a behavioral sign of a hallucination-like state—both hippocampal and visual cortical neurons temporarily increase firing rates. When rats are immobile, LSD enhances cortical firing synchrony similar to the wakefulness-to-sleep transition, while hippocampal-cortical interaction remains dampened but hippocampal awake reactivation persists. These findings suggest LSD suppresses hippocampal-cortical interactions during active behavior and immobility, degrading and isolating internal hippocampal representations from external sensory input, which may contribute to abnormal perceptions.