Toxoplasma gondii influences aversive behaviors of female rats in an estrus cycle dependent manner.
Toxoplasma gondii influences aversive behaviors of female rats in an estrus cycle dependent manner.
复制标题
弓形虫以发情周期依赖性方式影响雌性大鼠的厌恶行为。
DOI：
10.1016/j.physbeh.2014.05.036
复制
发表时间：
2014
影响因子：
2.9
通讯作者：
Sapolsky,RobertM
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Golcu,Doruk;Gebre,RahiwaZ;Sapolsky,RobertM
弓形虫（Toxoplasma gondii，T.弓形虫）操纵其啮齿类中间宿主的行为以促进其传递至其猫科最终宿主。这是通过减少啮齿动物对猫气味的厌恶反应来实现的，这可能会增加捕食风险。女性的平均变化与男性相似。然而，与厌恶和吸引有关的行为通常受到发情周期的强烈影响。在这项研究中，我们复制了T. gondiin雌性大鼠，以及扩展到两个新的行为模式。我们还描述了发情周期在T. gondiion雌性大鼠。未感染的雌性更喜欢花更多的时间接近兔子而不是山猫的尿液，并且在黑暗的房间里而不是明亮的房间里。受感染的雌性动物失去了这两种偏好，并且花了更多的时间来研究社会新奇事物（环境中的外国床上用品）。总的来说，这些数据表明，感染使女性不那么厌恶风险，更具有探索性。此外，这种效应还受到发情周期的影响。在整个周期中，未感染的大鼠喜欢兔尿而不是山猫尿，但发情期和发情后期除外。相比之下，感染的大鼠在周期的每个阶段都失去了这种偏好，除了发情期。与这种可能性相对应的是，这是一种依赖于病毒的效应，受感染的大鼠循环中的孕酮水平升高，这是一种已知的抗焦虑药。
The protozoan Toxoplasma gondii (T. gondii) manipulates the behavior of its rodent intermediate host to facilitate its passage to its feline definitive host. This is accomplished by a reduction of the aversive response that rodents show towards cat odors, which likely increases the predation risk. Females on average show similar changes as males. However, behaviors that relate to aversion and attraction are usually strongly influenced by the estrus cycle. In this study, we replicated behavioral effects ofT. gondiiin female rats, as well as expanded it to two novel behavioral paradigms. We also characterized the role of the estrus cycle in the behavioral effects ofT. gondiion female rats. Uninfected females preferred to spend more time in proximity to rabbit rather than bobcat urine, and in a dark chamber rather than a lit chamber. Infected females lost both of these preferences, and also spent more time investigating social novelty (foreign bedding in their environment). Taken together, these data suggest that infection makes females less risk averse and more exploratory. Furthermore, this effect was influenced by the estrus cycle. Uninfected rats preferred rabbit urine to bobcat urine throughout the cycle except at estrus and metestrus. In contrast, infected rats lost this preference at every stage of the cycle except estrus. Commensurate with the possibility that this was a hormone-dependent effect, infected rats had elevated levels of circulating progesterone, a known anxiolytic.