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Low Dose Prenatal Alcohol Exposure Does Not Impair Spatial Learning and Memory in Two Tests in Adult and Aged Rats

Consumption of alcohol during pregnancy can have detrimental impacts on the developing hippocampus, which can lead to deficits in learning and memory function. Although high levels of alcohol exposure can lead to severe deficits, there is a lack of research examining the effects of low levels of exp...

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Autores principales: Cullen, Carlie L., Burne, Thomas H. J., Lavidis, Nickolas A., Moritz, Karen M.
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Public Library of Science 2014
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4076304/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24978807
http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0101482
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author Cullen, Carlie L.
Burne, Thomas H. J.
Lavidis, Nickolas A.
Moritz, Karen M.
author_facet Cullen, Carlie L.
Burne, Thomas H. J.
Lavidis, Nickolas A.
Moritz, Karen M.
author_sort Cullen, Carlie L.
collection PubMed
description Consumption of alcohol during pregnancy can have detrimental impacts on the developing hippocampus, which can lead to deficits in learning and memory function. Although high levels of alcohol exposure can lead to severe deficits, there is a lack of research examining the effects of low levels of exposure. This study used a rat model to determine if prenatal exposure to chronic low dose ethanol would result in deficits in learning and memory performance and if this was associated with morphological changes within the hippocampus. Sprague Dawley rats were fed a liquid diet containing 6% (vol/vol) ethanol (EtOH) or an isocaloric control diet throughout gestation. Male and Female offspring underwent behavioural testing at 8 (Adult) or 15 months (Aged) of age. Brains from these animals were collected for stereological analysis of pyramidal neuron number and dendritic morphology within the CA1 and CA3 regions of the dorsal hippocampus. Prenatal ethanol exposed animals did not differ in spatial learning or memory performance in the Morris water maze or Y maze tasks compared to Control offspring. There was no effect of prenatal ethanol exposure on pyramidal cell number or density within the dorsal hippocampus. Overall, this study indicates that chronic low dose prenatal ethanol exposure in this model does not have long term detrimental effects on pyramidal cells within the dorsal hippocampus or impair spatial learning and memory performance.
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spelling pubmed-40763042014-07-02 Low Dose Prenatal Alcohol Exposure Does Not Impair Spatial Learning and Memory in Two Tests in Adult and Aged Rats Cullen, Carlie L. Burne, Thomas H. J. Lavidis, Nickolas A. Moritz, Karen M. PLoS One Research Article Consumption of alcohol during pregnancy can have detrimental impacts on the developing hippocampus, which can lead to deficits in learning and memory function. Although high levels of alcohol exposure can lead to severe deficits, there is a lack of research examining the effects of low levels of exposure. This study used a rat model to determine if prenatal exposure to chronic low dose ethanol would result in deficits in learning and memory performance and if this was associated with morphological changes within the hippocampus. Sprague Dawley rats were fed a liquid diet containing 6% (vol/vol) ethanol (EtOH) or an isocaloric control diet throughout gestation. Male and Female offspring underwent behavioural testing at 8 (Adult) or 15 months (Aged) of age. Brains from these animals were collected for stereological analysis of pyramidal neuron number and dendritic morphology within the CA1 and CA3 regions of the dorsal hippocampus. Prenatal ethanol exposed animals did not differ in spatial learning or memory performance in the Morris water maze or Y maze tasks compared to Control offspring. There was no effect of prenatal ethanol exposure on pyramidal cell number or density within the dorsal hippocampus. Overall, this study indicates that chronic low dose prenatal ethanol exposure in this model does not have long term detrimental effects on pyramidal cells within the dorsal hippocampus or impair spatial learning and memory performance. Public Library of Science 2014-06-30 /pmc/articles/PMC4076304/ /pubmed/24978807 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0101482 Text en © 2014 Cullen et al http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are properly credited.
spellingShingle Research Article
Cullen, Carlie L.
Burne, Thomas H. J.
Lavidis, Nickolas A.
Moritz, Karen M.
Low Dose Prenatal Alcohol Exposure Does Not Impair Spatial Learning and Memory in Two Tests in Adult and Aged Rats
title Low Dose Prenatal Alcohol Exposure Does Not Impair Spatial Learning and Memory in Two Tests in Adult and Aged Rats
title_full Low Dose Prenatal Alcohol Exposure Does Not Impair Spatial Learning and Memory in Two Tests in Adult and Aged Rats
title_fullStr Low Dose Prenatal Alcohol Exposure Does Not Impair Spatial Learning and Memory in Two Tests in Adult and Aged Rats
title_full_unstemmed Low Dose Prenatal Alcohol Exposure Does Not Impair Spatial Learning and Memory in Two Tests in Adult and Aged Rats
title_short Low Dose Prenatal Alcohol Exposure Does Not Impair Spatial Learning and Memory in Two Tests in Adult and Aged Rats
title_sort low dose prenatal alcohol exposure does not impair spatial learning and memory in two tests in adult and aged rats
topic Research Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4076304/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24978807
http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0101482
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