Experimental biology and medicine
-
Exp. Biol. Med. (Maywood) · Mar 2009
Environmental enrichment induces synaptic structural modification after transient focal cerebral ischemia in rats.
Environmental enrichment (EE), where animals are exposed to a complex novel environment, has been shown to induce synaptic plasticity in both intact and injured animals. The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of EE on spatial memory and structural modifications of synaptic junctions in rats following transient focal cerebral ischemia. Adult male Sprague-Dawley rats underwent right middle cerebral artery occlusion (MCAO) for 40 min and reperfusion. ⋯ The results showed that the content of NMDAR1 was not altered in MCAO rats of EE; however, the phosphorylated NMDAR1 increased significantly when compared with the standard environment housing MCAO rats. In addition, EE inhibited the impaired expression of PSD-95 induced by MCAO in parietal cortex and hippocampus. These data suggest that improved spatial memory of cerebral ischemic rats by EE is associated with structural modifications of synaptic junctions in several brain regions.