NeuropharmacologyEffects of environmental and pharmacological stressors on c-fos and corticotropin-releasing factor mRNA in rat brain: Relationship to the reinstatement of alcohol seeking
Section snippets
Animals
Fifty-six male Wistar rats (Charles River, Montreal, Quebec, Canada) weighing 300–350g were maintained at 22°C (light phase 07:00 h–19:00 h) with free access to food and water. Experimental procedures were done in compliance with guidelines of the Canadian Council on Animal Care, as well as those of National Institutes of Health Publication 85-23 (1996), and were approved by the animal care committee of the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health. In these experiments, all efforts were made to
c-fos mRNA
The effects of administration of the environmental stressors footshock, restraint or social defeat on c-fos mRNA in discrete regions of the rat brain are shown in Table 1, panel A. ANOVA revealed a significant effect of Stressor type in the three frontal cortical regions measured (MFC, OFC and ACg), the NACs, the septal nuclei (MS and LS), dBNST and vBNST, BLA and CeA, dHIPP, VTA, DRN and MRN and LC (P’s<0.05). Post hoc analysis of these regions revealed that all three stressors increased c-fos
Discussion
The purpose of the present study was to determine the neural substrates underlying the effectiveness of stressors in inducing reinstatement of alcohol seeking, using the technique of in situ hybridization of c-fos and CRF mRNA. We report differential effects of stressors in several brain regions previously shown to be involved in the rewarding effects of drugs of abuse. The two stressors effective in inducing reinstatement of alcohol seeking, the environmental stressor footshock and the
Acknowledgments
This work was support in part by grants from the Integrative Neuroscience Initiative on Alcoholism (East) to D. Funk and NIAAA (AA13108) to A. D. Lê.
References (64)
- et al.
Antagonistic effects of caffeine and yohimbine in animal tests of anxiety
Eur J Pharmacol
(1989) - et al.
Pattern and time course of immediate early gene expression in rat brain following acute stress
Neuroscience
(1995) - et al.
Pattern and time course of immediate early gene expression in the brain following acute stress
Neuroscience
(1995) - et al.
Effect of blockade of corticotropin-releasing factor receptors in the median raphe nucleus on stress-induced c-fos mRNA in the rat brain
Neuroscience
(2003) - et al.
Rapid habituation of hippocampal serotonin and norepinephrine release and anxiety-related behaviors, but not plasma corticosterone levels, to repeated footshock stress in rats
Pharmacol Biochem Behav
(2003) - et al.
Stress-induced social avoidancea new model of stress-induced anxiety?
Physiol Behav
(2002) - et al.
Defeat is a major stressor in males while social instability is stressful mainly in femalestowards the development of a social stress model in female rats
Brain Res Bull
(1999) - et al.
Selective activation of dopamine transmission in the shell of the nucleus accumbens by stress
Brain Res
(1995) c-Fos as a transcription factora stressful (re)view from a functional map
Neurochem Int
(1998)- et al.
Neurobiology of relapse to alcohol in rats
Pharmacol Ther
(2002)