Behavioral effects and pattern of brain c-fos mRNA induced by 2,5-dihydro-2,4,5-trimethylthiazoline, a component of fox feces odor in GAD67-GFP knock-in C57BL/6 mice

Predator odors, which are non-intrusive and naturalistic stressors of high ethological relevance, were used to study the neurobiology of innate fear in rodents. The present study investigates behavioral effects and the induction of c-fos mRNA in adult male predator naive mice caused by acute exposure to 2,5-dihydro-2,4,5-trimethylthiazoline (TMT), a component of the fox feces odor. On the behavioral level, TMT potently increased unconditioned freezing and decreased non-defensive grooming behavior. With quantitative real time PCR we established a strong TMT-induced activation in the bed nucleus of the stria terminalis (BNST) (eight-fold increase, p < 0.016) and in the ventral olfactory bulb (two-fold increase, p < 0.036). In contrast, no significant TMT-induced c-fos induction could be observed in the dorsal olfactory bulb or in the amygdala. Our results display robust fear responses of GAD67-GFP knock-in mice exposed to TMT and suggest that the ventral olfactory bulb and the BNST are strongly activated during the elicitation of fear through predator odor in these transgenic mice.