Metabotropic glutamate (mGlu) receptors and, in particular, mGlu5 are crucially involved in forms of hippocampus-dependent synaptic plasticity that are believed to also underlie extinction learning. MGlu5 is also required for information transfer through neuronal oscillations and for spatial memory. This places this receptor in a unique position with regard to information encoding. Therefore, neurophysiologists and biopsychologists from Bochum explored the role of this receptor in context-dependent extinction learning under constant, or changed, contextual conditions. Their results support that although extinction learning in a new context is unaffected by mGlu5 antagonism, extinction of the consolidated context is impaired. This suggests that mGlu5 is intrinsically involved in enabling learning that once-relevant information is no longer valid.

André, M.A.E, Güntürkün, O., Manahan-Vaughan, D., The metabotropic glutamate receptor, mGlu5, is required for extinction learning that occurs in the absence of a context change. Hippocampus, 2015, 25: 149–158.