Neuroscience
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In juvenile and young adult mice monocular deprivation (MD) shifts the ocular dominance (OD) of binocular neurons in the primary visual cortex (V1) away from the deprived eye. However, OD plasticity is completely absent in mice older than 110 days, but can be reactivated by treatments which decrease GABA levels in V1. Typically, these OD shifts can be prevented by increasing GABAergic transmission with diazepam. ⋯ On the contrary, this treatment led to a depression of V1 input through the previously closed contralateral eye, the characteristic signature of OD plasticity in juvenile mice during the critical period. Interestingly, the same result was obtained after AD. Taken together, these results suggest that cross-modally restored OD plasticity does not only depend on reduction of GABA levels in V1, but also requires other, so far unknown mechanisms.
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Circadian rhythms in many brain regions and peripheral organs can be entrained by daily feeding schedules. The set of feeding-related signals that entrain peripheral clocks are tissue specific and include nutrients, metabolic hormones and temperature. Signals that entrain neural circadian clocks to mealtime have yet to be established for any brain region. ⋯ Group synchrony in anosmic mice was restored by restricted feeding. The OB circadian clock is food-entrainable, entrains gradually to a mid-day meal, and requires neither olfaction nor circadian signaling from olfactory sensory neurons. The OB can be used as a model system for analysis of input pathways by which circadian clocks in the brain entrain to daily mealtimes.
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Diet-induced obesity induces peripheral inflammation accompanied by a loss of myenteric neurons. Few studies, however, have investigated the effects of a high-fat diet (HFD) on either the development of myenteric neurons or prior to the occurrence of obesity. The present study assessed the effects of maternal HFD on the density and neurochemical phenotype of myenteric ganglia in the upper gastrointestinal tract. ⋯ HFD also increased myenteric plexus glial cell density in all regions by 4 weeks of age. These changes occurred in the absence of an increase in serum or gastric inflammatory markers. The present study suggests that exposure to a HFD during the perinatal time period results in glial proliferation and loss of inhibitory nitrergic neurons prior to the onset of obesity, suggesting that dietary alterations may affect gastrointestinal functions independently of increased adiposity or glycemic dysregulation.
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A marked decrease in parvalbumin (PV), a calcium-binding protein specific to a subset of GABAergic neurons, is a consistent finding in postmortem schizophrenic brain tissue. This reduction is selective to PV and is regionally specific, occurring primarily in the prefrontal cortex and hippocampus (HPC) of patients. Rodent models of NMDA receptor hypofunction utilizing NMDA antagonist treatments - e.g. ketamine (KET) - show schizophrenia-like cognitive and behavioral impairments with parallel changes in PV. ⋯ Our findings suggest an effect of age, but not sacrifice timeline, on PV cell count following 14 days of sub-anesthetic KET treatment. We provide evidence that 1-month-old rats exhibit a significant KET-induced HPC PV decrease, while adult rats show a modest increase in HPC PV following chronic KET. Taken together, we propose that PV is a dynamic marker, and that changes in cell counts - and their interpretation - following NDMA antagonist treatment should be considered in the context of age.