Intralaminar nuclei

Henderson J., Carpenter K., Cartwright H., Halliday G. (2000a). Loss of thalamic intralaminar nuclei in progressive supranuclear palsy and Parkinson s disease clinical and therapeutic implications. Brain 123(7), 1410-21. 

A global view of consciousness is that it is generated throughout the entire brain, as a result of synchronisation of relevant neural networks. Specific systems or regions—for example the cerebral cortex, brainstem reticular formation and thalamic nuclei—may be key anatomical integrators. Areas with the most widespread interconnections are pivotal, and on this basis the cortex and thalamus are more relevant than cerebellum and striatum for example. Frontal cortex for example connects with every other brain region, both in terms of input and output, with 80% of such connections accounted for by cortico-cortical connections. Thalamic intralaminar nuclei are, in conjunction with the reticular nucleus, reciprocally connected to all cortical areas. By contrast the cerebellum has very few output pathways and striatal-cortical input is (via the thalamus) confined to frontal lobe. 

DA modulates in the STh neurons the activity of the glutamatergic cortical afferents and GABAergic pallidal afferents (Hamani et al., 2004). Dopaminergic terminals, which contact mainly the neck of dendritic spines, establish synaptic contacts with the distal dendrites of STh neurons. These receive synaptic input also from thalamic fibers deriving from the intralaminar nuclei, serotonergic input deriving from the dorsal raphe nucleus and glutamatergic input from the motor cortex. Inhibitory pallidal afferents innervate mostly the proximal dendrites and the cell body of STh neurons. 

Macchi G, Bentivoglio M (1986) The thalamic intralaminar nuclei and the cerebral cortex. In Jones EG, Peters A (Eds), Cerebral Cortex, Vol. 5, pp. 355-401. Plenum Press, New York. 

Output targets of the substantia nigra include the following the thalamus, superior colliculus and the pedunculopontine nucleus (Beckstead 1979 Deniau and Chevalier 1992 Gerfen et al. 1982 Kita and Kitai 1987 Nakanishi et al. 1987b). Nigral inputs to the thalamus are directed to two main parts of the thalamus. The first are the set of nuclei, including the intralaminar nuclei, which project back to the striatum. The second... 

Thalamic afferents in the striatum from the parafascicular/intralaminar nuclei are organized relative to the patch matrix compartments (Beckstead 1985 Berendse et al. 1988 Herkenham and Pert 1981 Xu et al. 1991). Inputs from the parafascicular/ centromedian thalamic nuclei provide inputs directed to the matrix compartment. Inputs to the striatal patch compartment arise from more restricted parts of the intralaminar thalamic nuclei. 

Minciacchi, D. Granato, A. Antonini, A. Sbriccoli, A. Macehi, G. A procedure for the simultaneous visualization of two anterograde and different retrograde fluorescent tracers application to the smdy of the afferent-efferent organization of thalamic anterior intralaminar nuclei. J. Neurosci. Methods 1991, 38, 183-191. 

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