The purpose of the present study was to improve our understanding of the role of NMDA receptors in neocortical synaptic plasticity. In slices of rat visual cortex the field potential elicited in layer III in response to white matter stimulation…
In order to investigate the possible relationship among the olfactory bulb (OB), norepinephrine (NE) and gonadal steroids, we measured NE release from superfused anterior and posterior OB in intact and castrated male rats (Expt. I) as well as in…
We compared the connections of two areas within rat cingulate cortex, the Cg1/Cg2 area vs the Cg3 area, by iontophoresing small quantities of wheatgerm agglutinin-horseradish peroxidase (WGA-HRP) into either of these two divisions and identifying…
The aim of this study was to examine: (1) whether long-term potentiation (LTP) can be induced in slices from adult rat visual cortex under conditions where inhibition is not antagonized, and (2) the role of N-methyl-D-aspartate (NMDA) receptors in…
In the present experiment peri-pubertal female mice were treated with a partially purified puberty accelerating urine extract (PAUE). Mice treated with the PAUE showed an advance in the onset of puberty as indicated by significantly increased uterine…
Male retired breeder C57/Bl and CD-1 mice were treated with either MPTP or its vehicle. At 7-10 days post-treatment, catecholamine concentrations within the olfactory bulbs (OB) and hypothalamus were determined. Norepinephrine concentrations within…
In rats, restraint exposure potentiates the magnitude and duration of analgesia following both the peripheral and intracerebroventricular administration of several opioid agonists as compared to non-stressed controls. It has been suggested that the…
In the present experiment, 6-OHDA was infused directly into the olfactory bulb (OB) to produce a localized neurotoxic lesion. Habituation/dishabituation behavioral tests were then conducted to measure recognition responses to chemical cues (urine as…
Male mice treated with MPTP or vehicle were tested for their ability to demonstrate a memory-recognition response as evaluated in a habituation-dishabituation task. Treatment with MPTP severely disrupted the male's habituation-dishabituation response…
This study was designed to determine the influence of the hypothalamus on the content of vasoactive intestinal peptide (VIP) in the anterior pituitary. Disruption of the hypothalamic-pituitary connection was performed by ablating the arcuate-median…
The effects of spermine, an endogenous polyamine, were examined in area CA1 of the rat hippocampal slice preparation. Spermine, at low millimolar concentrations, rapidly and potently depressed NMDA and K/AMPA-mediated population EPSPs, and…
We have recently reported that treatment of gonadectomized female and male C57/B1 mice with the gonadal steroid hormone, estrogen, reduced nigrostriatal dopaminergic neurotoxicity resulting from the Parkinson's-like inducing agent
The antiestrogen, tamoxifen (TMX), has been shown to function as a neuroprotectant against the nigrostriatal dopaminergic (NSDA) neurotoxin, methamphetamine (MA), within male mice. In the present report, we examined the effects of a combined infusion…
It has been reported that male mice are more susceptible to the neurotoxic effects of methamphetamine (MA) upon the nigrostriatal dopaminergic (NSDA) system. Since MA utilizes the dopamine transporter (DAT) to exert its effects, in the present study,…
Recently prepulse inhibition of the acoustic startle reflex (ASR) became a popular technique for tinnitus assessment in laboratory animals. This method confers a significant advantage over the previously used time-consuming behavioral approaches…
The effects of in vivo estrogen treatment upon MPP(+)-induced dopamine (DA) release were determined using in vivo microdialysis in female and male rats. Ovariectomized female rats were implanted or not with an estrogen pellet (0.1 mg, 17beta…
Profound reductions in choline acetyl-transferase (ChAT) activity are reliable markers for cholinergic hypoactivity associated with cognitive function deficit in Alzheimer's disease (AD). Par-4 (prostate apoptosis response-4) is a novel mediator of…
The gonadal steroid hormone estrogen (E) can function as a neuroprotectant of nigrostriatal dopaminergic (NSDA) neurotoxicity, however, there exists very limited information on the role of testosterone (T) in this capacity. In the present report, the…
Although Par-4 (prostate apoptosis response-4) is involved in initiation of neurodegenerative cascades associated with certain neurodegenerative disorders, normal physiological roles of Par-4 in neurons have remained elusive. It was recently reported…
Mutations in presenilin-1 (PS-1) have been shown to increase neuronal vulnerability to apoptosis in Alzheimer's disease (AD). Par-4 is a novel cell-death-promoting protein associated with neuronal degeneration in AD. We previously reported that, in…
Mesial temporal lobe epilepsy is a relatively common form of epilepsy that afflicts many thousands of people. It has been suggested that the development of primary and secondary foci may involve mechanisms similar to long-term potentiation (LTP). In…
The effects of estrogen upon MPTP-induced neurotoxicity were examined using in vitro superfusion. In Experiment 1, striatal tissue from ovariectomized rats was infused with MPP+ (10 microM), a combination of MPP+ and 17beta-estradiol (300 nM), the…
It has been demonstrated that castration alters the functioning of the olfactory bulb (OB)-norepinephrine (NE) system. In the present experiment, we examined one of the mechanisms by which castration modulates the OB-NE system by comparing NE uptake…
Previous research has demonstrated that the antinociceptive efficacy of opioids decreases with advancing age. This study utilized radioligand binding techniques to determine if this decline is due to a change in the receptor density (Bmax) and/or…
Although chronic neuropathic pain disorders are more prevalent in the senescent population, little is known about how the aging process alters the thermal hyperalgesic sensitivity to peripheral nerve injury. In this study, neuropathic pain was…
To determine the feasibility of assessing dopamine uptake using in vitro superfusion, striatal tissue from ovariectomized female rats was infused with dopamine (1 microM), nomifensine (1 mM), or a combination of dopamine and nomifensine. Treatment…
Long-term potentiation (LTP), intensively studied in the hippocampus as a possible mnemonic device, has begun to be studied in the neocortex. In this study the effects of varying tetanic stimulus parameters on LTP of field potentials recorded from…
These studies were designed to investigate how the aging process alters the spinal antinociceptive efficacy of mu (mu), delta (delta) and epsilon (epsilon) opioid receptor agonists administered intrathecally (i.t.) in rats. Various doses of the mu…
Male C57/B1 mice received bilateral intranasal infusions of saline, MPTP or an intraperitoneal injection of MPTP. Infusions were performed using a peristaltic pump at a setting of 100 microliters/min. The MPTP, diluted in saline at concentrations of…
Ovariectomized rats treated or not with an estradiol pellet were subjected to an unilateral intrastriatal infusion of 6-hydroxydopamine (6-OHDA). Various parameters of nigrostriatal dopaminergic function as derived from measurements of dopamine and…
Levels of growth hormone (GH) are reduced in the genetically obese Zucker rat, fa/fa, in comparison to lean littermates. In normal rats, GH release is regulated by stimulatory and inhibitory factors of hypothalamic origin. The present experiment…
The neurochemical and anatomical heterogeneity of dopamine uptake blockade was studied at a medial and lateral position in each of 3 rostrocaudal areas of the rat caudate-putamen. In vivo voltammetric measures of extracellular dopamine indicated a…
Long-lasting potentiation can be induced in area CA1 of hippocampus by a relatively brief (7-10 min) exposure to a higher (4.0 mM) than normal (2.0 mM) extracellular calcium concentration. We have found that long-lasting calcium-induced potentiation…
The mechanism of disinhibition produced by (+/-)-baclofen was studied using intracellular recording in area CA1 of rat hippocampal slices. Baclofen reversibly depressed monosynaptic IPSPs evoked by direct activation of interneurons in the presence of…
The in vitro rodent visual cortical slice preparation demonstrates a critical period for long-term potentiation (LTP). Current source density (CSD) analysis reveals peak potentiation of both supra-(layers II-III) and infragranular (layers V) layers…
The nuclear bag1 intrafusal fiber mediates the dynamic (velocity) sensitivity, whereas the nuclear bag2 and nuclear chain fibers mediate the static (length) sensitivity of muscle spindles to stretch. The pattern of branching of primary and secondary…
The neurochemical heterogeneity of the rat striatum was assessed in vivo by measuring subregional changes in extracellular dopamine and DOPAC by in vivo electrochemistry and microdialysis in response to amphetamine and the D2 antagonist,…
In animal models for fragile X syndrome where the gene for fragile X mental retardation protein is knocked out (Fmr1 KO), neurotransmission in multiple brain regions shifts excitation/inhibition balance, resulting in hyperexcitability in neural…
Considerable evidence suggests that left hemispheric lateralization for language comprehension in humans is associated with cortical microstructural asymmetries. However, despite the fact that left hemispheric dominance for the analysis of…
