Brain's Memory Center Pathways Unite for Reward Processing

UMBC study reveals how hippocampal regions converge in the nucleus accumbens to guide goal-directed actions.

Apr. 11, 2026 at 1:42am

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An abstract, highly structured painting in soft, earthy tones of green, brown, and blue, featuring sweeping geometric arcs, concentric circles, and precise botanical or physical spirals, conveying the complex interplay between different regions of the brain involved in reward processing and decision-making.A conceptual illustration depicting the intricate neural pathways that link the brain's memory center to its reward processing region, guiding goal-directed actions.Baltimore Today

New research from the University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC) reveals how two different parts of the brain's memory center, the dorsal and ventral hippocampus, team up in the nucleus accumbens, a key reward region, to help mice and likely humans combine memories of places and contexts with the drive to pursue rewards. The findings offer fresh insight into how the brain integrates information about 'where' and 'what feels good' to guide everyday decisions.

Why it matters

Better understanding of how these reward-related circuits process and combine information could shed light on conditions where motivation is disrupted, such as depression, addiction, or anxiety disorders. The discovery challenges the previous view that connections from the dorsal and ventral hippocampus were mostly separate, revealing a hidden layer of cooperation between these pathways that shapes the decisions driving daily life.

The details

The research team used advanced methods including optogenetics, precise electrical activity recordings, and high-resolution microscope imaging to identify a group of neurons in the nucleus accumbens that receive direct input from both the dorsal and ventral hippocampus. They found that when both inputs are active at the same time, they produce a stronger combined response than either one alone, suggesting the brain may use this strategy widely to link a particular context with feeling and action.

  • The study was published in the Journal of Neuroscience in April 2026.

The players

Tara LeGates

Assistant professor in UMBC's Department of Biological Sciences and the study's senior author.

Ashley Copenhaver

The study's first author, a Ph.D. student in neuroscience and cognitive sciences at UMBC who led much of the hands-on work in recordings and imaging while mentoring undergraduate team members.

Tagide deCarvalho

Director of UMBC's Keith Porter Imaging Facility, who collaborated with the research team to obtain the high-resolution imaging that confirmed the close partnerships between the dorsal and ventral hippocampus inputs on the same neurons.

University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC)

The institution where the research was conducted.

Journal of Neuroscience

The academic journal that published the study.

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What they’re saying

“The connection between the hippocampus and nucleus accumbens is where the brain's map of where to go meets a sense of why it's worth going.”

— Tara LeGates, Assistant professor, UMBC Department of Biological Sciences

“A single neuron can receive inputs from different brain regions, and figuring out how it integrates them is crucial for understanding what drives goal-directed actions.”

— Tara LeGates, Assistant professor, UMBC Department of Biological Sciences

“One of the most exciting parts of this technically challenging project was performing dual-color optogenetics during electrophysiology—I was literally shining tiny beams of red and blue light onto brain tissue, which was activating the dorsal or ventral hippocampus neurons, so that I could record the electrical responses in the nucleus accumbens neurons. It was magical.”

— Ashley Copenhaver, Ph.D. student, neuroscience and cognitive sciences, UMBC

What’s next

The LeGates lab is already building on this paper's foundation by exploring how stress and substances like food, medications, and illicit drugs affect these same connections, with the long-term aim of informing more targeted treatments for various mental health conditions. In the immediate future, the team hopes to record activity from these specially connected neurons during real behaviors to directly link the newly discovered crosstalk between the ventral and dorsal hippocampus to actions.

The takeaway

This discovery advances our understanding of how the brain weaves together memory and motivation, a fundamental process that shapes the decisions driving daily life. By uncovering this hidden layer of cooperation between hippocampal pathways, the research offers new insights into the neural mechanisms underlying goal-directed behavior and could inform treatments for conditions where motivation is disrupted.