Search results for "Thigmotaxis"
showing 5 items of 5 documents
Water maze performance, exploratory activity, inhibitory avoidance and hippocampal plasticity in aged superior and inferior learners
2002
In 28- to 30-month-old rats, in vitro short-term and long-term potentiation (STP and LTP) were measured in area CA1 of the hippocampus in seven superior and seven inferior learners, that were selected from a pool of 40 rats based on water maze escape performance over a period of 9 days. The aim was to examine whether levels of STP and LTP could account for group differences in learning of water maze escape, spatial preference and wall (thigmotaxis)-avoidance and in short-term retention of an inhibitory avoidance task. There was no significant group difference in open-field exploration, i.e. the number of rearings. In contrast to expectation, the superior and inferior learners did not differ…
Contralateral increase in thigmotactic scanning following unilateral barrel-cortex lesion in mice.
2005
Adult C57BL/6 mice received uni- or bilateral cryogenic or sham-lesions over the barrel field and their exploratory behaviour was assessed in an open field between 1 and 7 days post-lesion. Bilateral cortical lesions produced a short-lasting increase in thigmotactic scanning with both sides of the face on the first day of testing. Mice with a unilateral barrel-cortex lesion showed more contralateral wall scanning with a recovery to behavioural symmetry after 5-7 days. Furthermore, the increase in contralateral thigmotaxis was most pronounced in animals with damage to the left barrel field, indicative of a lateralization of the lesion-induced behavioural changes. The cortical lesions did not…
Over-expression of two different forms of the α-secretase ADAM10 affects learning and memory in mice
2006
Members of the ADAM family (adisintegrin and metalloprotease) are the main candidates for physiologically relevant alpha-secretases. The alpha-secretase cleaves in the non-amyloidogenic pathway the amyloid precursor protein within the region of the Abeta peptides preventing their aggregation in the brain. The increase of alpha-secretase activity in the brain provides a plausible strategy to prevent Abeta formation. Concerning this possibility two transgenic mouse lines (FVB/N) have been created: mice over-expressing the bovine form of the alpha-secretase (ADAM10) and mice over-expressing an inactive form of the alpha-secretase (ADAM10-E348A-HA; ADAM10-dn). For behavioral examination a F1 ge…
Endocannabinoids render exploratory behaviour largely independent of the test aversiveness: role of glutamatergic transmission.
2009
To investigate the impact of averseness, controllability and familiarity of a test situation on the involvement of the endocannabinoid system in the regulation of exploratory behaviour, we tested conventional and conditional cannabinoid receptor type 1 (CB1)-deficient mice in behavioural paradigms with different emotional load, which depended on the strength of illumination and the ability of the animals to avoid the light stimulus. Complete CB1 null-mutant mice (Total-CB1-KO) showed an anxiogenic-like phenotype under circumstances where they were able to avoid the bright light such as the elevated plus-maze and the light/dark avoidance task. Conditional mutant mice lacking CB1 expression s…
Age differences in the role of the cannabinoid type 1 receptor on glutamatergic neurons in habituation and spatial memory acquisition
2015
Abstract Aims Aging is typically linked with a decline in memory performance and alterations in neural integrity. In pathological aging such as Alzheimer's disease, these effects are aggravated. Studies using cannabinoid CB1 receptor-deficient mice have shown a role of the endocannabinoid system in memory processing and neuroprotection. As the CB1 receptor is expressed in various neuronal populations, in this study, we aimed at investigating the consequences of CB1 receptor gene inactivation in cortical glutamatergic neurons in mice (Glu-CB1-KO) in regard to age-related alterations in spatial memory performance. Main methods Juvenile (5.5–7.5 weeks), adult (5.5–7 months), and old (11.5–14 m…