Persistent activation of central amygdala CRF neurons helps drive the immediate fear extinction deficit

Fear extinction is an active learning process whereby previously established conditioned responses to a conditioned stimulus are suppressed. Paradoxically, when extinction training is performed immediately following fear acquisition, the extinction memory is weakened. Here, we demonstrate that corticotrophin-releasing factor (CRF)-expressing neurons in the central amygdala (CeA) antagonize the extinction memory following immediate extinction training. CeA-CRF neurons transition from responding to the unconditioned stimulus to the conditioned stimulus during the acquisition of a fear memory that persists during immediate extinction training, but diminishes during delayed extinction training. Inhibition of CeA-CRF neurons during immediate extinction training is sufficient to promote enhanced extinction memories, and activation of these neurons following delay extinction training is sufficient to reinstate a previously extinguished fear memory. These results demonstrate CeA-CRF neurons are an important substrate for the persistence of fear and have broad implications for the neural basis of persistent negative affective behavioral states. Learned conditioned fear associations can be weakened (extinction learning), but extinction is less effective if performed too soon after the original fear conditioning. Here, the authors show that persistent activation of CRF-expressing neurons in the central amygdala is involved in the early fear extinction deficit.