MORPHOLOGIC ALTERATIONS OF CHOLINE ACETYLTRANSFERASE-POSITIVE NEURONS IN THE BASAL FOREBRAIN OF AGED BEHAVIORALLY CHARACTERIZED FISHER 344 RATS
MORPHOLOGIC ALTERATIONS OF CHOLINE ACETYLTRANSFERASE-POSITIVE NEURONS IN THE BASAL FOREBRAIN OF AGED BEHAVIORALLY CHARACTERIZED FISHER 344 RATS
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DOI：
10.1016/0197-4580(93)90104-j
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发表时间：
1993-09-01
影响因子：
4.2
通讯作者：
GAGE, FH
中科院分区：
文献类型：
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作者：
ARMSTRONG, DM;SHEFFIELD, R;GAGE, FH
我们检查了Fisher 344只雌性大鼠，年龄分别为6、27和33个月。在处死和前脑胆碱能神经元的形态计量学分析之前，所有大鼠在Morris水迷宫中进行空间学习任务的行为表征。空间任务的性能允许随后分组的27个月和33个月大的动物到受损或非受损组。重要的是，随着年龄的增长，显示空间障碍的动物比例急剧增加。胆碱乙酰转移酶（ChAT）阳性神经元在整个基底前脑的大小和密度的定量评估显示，一个显着扩大的前脑胆碱能神经元内27个月大的非受损大鼠相比，6个月大的大鼠和27个月和33个月大的受损动物。这种尺寸的增加在内侧隔和斜角带核中最为明显。与6月龄对照组相比，27月龄受损大鼠仅在斜角带核中观察到ChAT阳性神经元密度的显著降低。尽管增大的前脑胆碱能神经元的意义尚不清楚，我们讨论的可能性，在老年啮齿动物神经元肿胀是一个积极的事件，并代表了衰老过程的早期表现，并可能构成一个恢复和/或或代偿事件，因为这些大鼠相对于其行为缺陷而言是无症状的。此外，我们还详细讨论了各种可能影响老年啮齿动物调查结果的技术和生命效应问题。
We examined Fisher 344 female rats aged 6, 27, and 33 months old. Prior to sacrifice and morphometric analyses of forebrain cholinergic neurons all rats underwent behavioral characterization in a spatial learning task using die Morris water maze. Performance on the spatial task permitted subsequent grouping of the 27- and 33-month-old animals into impaired or nonimpaired groups. Importantly, the percentage of animals that displayed spatial impairments increased sharply with advancing age. Quantitative assessment of the size and density of choline acetyltransferase (ChAT) - positive neurons throughout the basal forebrain revealed a significant enlargement of forebrain cholinergic neurons within 27-month-old nonimpaired rats compared to 6-month-old rats and 27- and 33-month-old impaired animals. This increase in size was most noted in the medial septum and nucleus of the diagonal band. Significant decreases in the density of ChAT-positive neurons was observed only in the nucleus of the diagonal band of 27-month-old impaired rats compared to 6-month-old controls.Although the significance of enlarged forebrain cholinergic neurons is unclear, we discuss the possibility that within aged rodents neuronal swelling is an active event and represents an early manifestation of the aging process and may constitute a restorative and/or compensatory event in that these rats are relatively asymptomatic with respect to their behavioral deficits. In addition, we discuss in some detail various technical and life effect issues which may vary the outcome of investigations of aged rodents.