Undernutrition induced by early pup separation delays the development of the thalamic reticular nucleus in rats.
A Golgi-Cox study was conducted in neurons of the reticular and lateralis thalamic nuclei in normally and early undernourished Wistar rats at 12, 20, and 30 days of age. In a total of 630 neurons the cell body and the dendritic field areas, as well as the number of dendritic prolongations from camera lucida drawings were quantitated. A general and significant reduction in most reticular thalamic nucleus measurements of early-food-deprived rats was observed compared with control littermates. Additionally, reticular thalamic cells in both normal and neonatally underfed rats exhibited a progressive decline, particularly in cell body area with increasing age. In contrast, the lateral thalamic nucleus did not show significant differences between groups when similar neuronal measurements were carried out. The reticular thalamic nucleus is normally related to the control of sensory afferent transmission, and early food deprivation interferes with the growing process of this nucleus. Therefore the present data support the hypothesis that noxious perinatal environmental influences may result in a maturational deficiency of central nervous system modulatory mechanisms.
D000818:Animals; D000831:Animals, Newborn / Q000254:growth & development; D005508:Food Deprivation; D051381:Rats; D011919:Rats, Inbred Strains; D012154:Reticular Formation / Q000254:growth & development; D013787:Thalamic Nuclei / Q000254:growth & development*