Involvement of orexinergic receptors in the nucleus accumbens, in the effect of forced swim stress on the reinstatement of morphine seeking behaviors

Orexinergic system is involved in primary rewards; the neural circuit of the ventral tegmental area (VTA), nucleus accumbens (NAc), prefrontal cortex and amygdala represents overlapping elements mediating the rewarding effects of drugs and stressful experiences. The NAc integrates reward-related information from the VTA. Also, it has been indicated that orexinergic system activates the mesolimbic dopamine projecting neurons to the NAc and promotes the development of reward in rodents. Therefore, in the present study, the conditioned place preference (CPP) paradigm was used to determine the role of the two types of orexin receptors (OXR) in the NAc in forced swim stress (FSS), as physical stress, and/or priming-induced reinstatement of morphine. The CPP was induced by injecting morphine (5 mg/kg, SC for 3 days) and lasted for eight free-morphine days; the reinstatement was induced by administration of effective priming dose of morphine (1 mg/kg; sc). The extinguished rats received intra-NAc injection of SB334867 as OX1R antagonist or TCSOX229 as OX2R antagonist before effective priming dose injection of morphine (1 mg/kg; sc). In others, the extinguished rats were given intra-NAc injection of SB334867 or TCSOX229 and then, they underwent FSS before injection of ineffective priming dose of morphine (0.5 mg/kg; sc). Our results showed that intra-accumbal administration of SB334867 or TCSOX229 could inhibit morphine priming- and FSS-induced reinstatement of extinguished morphine-seeking in the rats. It seems that OXR in the NAc may be involved in reward and could play an important role in the effect of stress on reinstatement of morphine-seeking behaviors in this area.