Abstract
Many neurological and psychiatric disorders stem from maladaptive conditioning and resist treatment. Tinnitus, as one example, is the distressing perception of sound in the absence of an external source. One of the network systems implicated in multiple disorders is the ‘salience network’, associated with positive/negative reward, habit formation, motivation, valuation and mood. However, it is not known whether directly modulating the ‘salience network’ at its anatomical and physiological core, in the ventral striatum, more specifically the nucleus accumbens, could be beneficial. Here we show that a novel treatment approach, targeting the salience network, can reduce tinnitus perception in a rat model. We found that bilateral rewarding stimulation of the nucleus accumbens, when paired with non-tinnitus tones, was most effective. A combined approach using rewarding accumbens stimulation and dysrewarding lateral habenula stimulation — paired with non-tinnitus and tinnitus tones, respectively — also suppressed tinnitus but caused negative effects. Our results demonstrate how the rewarding stimulation can recondition brain networks to effectively remove the salience of tinnitus frequencies. We anticipate that our unique reconditioning strategy has broader therapeutic applications for other brain disorders rooted in maladaptive learning.