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The Effect Of Spinal Cord Injury On Learning And Memory In Rats
Author(s) -
Tieu Jacqueline,
Zimmer M Beth
Publication year - 2015
Publication title -
the faseb journal
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.709
H-Index - 277
eISSN - 1530-6860
pISSN - 0892-6638
DOI - 10.1096/fasebj.29.1_supplement.840.1
Subject(s) - morris water navigation task , spinal cord injury , hippocampus , medicine , neuroscience , water maze , anesthesia , psychology , spinal cord
The effects of spinal cord injury (SCI) below the site of injury are well known. Changes above the site of injury, however, are not well described. Several studies have indicated significant changes in brain regions far removed from the site of injury, including cortical reorganization and neuronal loss in the hippocampus. A recent study showed reduced memory after T9 contusion injury and attributed the loss of function to increased inflammation. Another study showed that BDNF message and protein are also reduced in the hippocampus after T9 contusion injury. We hypothesized that learning and memory would be impaired after an upper cervical hemisection injury in young adult male rats and that reductions in serotonin may also be an underlying cause. C2 hemisection and sham surgeries were performed under aseptic technique, the rats were allowed to recover for 2 weeks and the Morris water maze and object recognition tests were performed to measure learning and memory. Tissues were collected for analysis. We found that SCI rats showed impairments during the acquisition phase of learning; they were slower at learning a task, but that they could still form memories over 5 days. We are currently looking at the possible involvement of serotonin as an underlying cause of the impaired learning.