ABSTRACT
James Olds will always be associated, along with postgraduate student Peter Milner, for discovering the pleasure centres and reward systems of the brain – a breakthrough that would begin to transform our understanding of motivation, emotion and addiction. An experienced laboratory technician who built much of his own equipment, Milner would introduce Olds to a number of new techniques including stereotaxic surgery, electrode construction and the administration of electrical stimulation. Olds had developed an interest in the reticular activating system – a diverse group of fibres extending from the brain stem to the thalamus, which then projected to widespread areas of the cerebral cortex. Olds and Milner quickly realised they had invented a powerful technique, which for the first time, allowed the reward systems of the brain to be mapped out in precise detail. As Olds examined all the self-stimulation sites in the brain, he realised they formed part of a large pathway called the medial forebrain bundle.
