TY - JOUR T1 - Role of the Cerebellar Cortex in Conditioned Goal-Directed Behavior JF - The Journal of Neuroscience JO - J. Neurosci. SP - 13265 LP - 13271 DO - 10.1523/JNEUROSCI.2190-10.2010 VL - 30 IS - 40 AU - Eric Burguière AU - Arnaud Arabo AU - Frederic Jarlier AU - Chris I. De Zeeuw AU - Laure Rondi-Reig Y1 - 2010/10/06 UR - http://www.jneurosci.org/content/30/40/13265.abstract N2 - Learning a new goal-directed behavioral task often requires the improvement of at least two processes, including an enhanced stimulus–response association and an optimization of the execution of the motor response. The cerebellum has recently been shown to play a role in acquiring goal-directed behavior, but it is unclear to what extent it contributes to a change in the stimulus–response association and/or the optimization of the execution of the motor response. We therefore designed the stimulus-dependent water Y-maze conditioning task, which allows discrimination between both processes, and we subsequently subjected Purkinje cell-specific mutant mice to this new task. The mouse mutants L7-PKCi, which suffer from impaired PKC-dependent processes such as parallel fiber to Purkinje cell long-term depression (PF-PC LTD), were able to acquire the stimulus–response association, but exhibited a reduced optimization of their motor performance. These data show that PF-PC LTD is not required for learning a stimulus–response association, but they do suggest that a PKC-dependent process in cerebellar Purkinje cells is required for optimization of motor responses. ER -