Experience-dependent changes in cortical whisker representation in the adult mouse: a 2-deoxyglucose study.
Sensory experience and learning can modify cortical body maps. We have previously reported that 3 days of classical conditioning, in which stimulation of a row of whiskers was paired with tail shock, produced an expansion of the cortical representation of the "trained row" labeled with 2-deoxyglucose (2DG), in layer IIIb and IV of the barrel cortex. The present study examined plastic remodelling of the vibrissal cortical representation after pairing whisker stimulation with a drop of sweet water. Cortical representations of rows of whiskers were mapped by 2DG autoradiography after 3 days and 2 months of training. The training resulted in enlargement of the cortical representation of vibrissae involved in the stimulus pairing compared with the contralateral representation of a row of whiskers, that were not touched during the training. This modification of whisker representation was different after short-term and long-term appetitive training. After three pairing sessions, changes in the width of cortical representation were visible in layers II/IIIa (29%) and layers V/VI (28%). After 2 months of training, significant changes in the width of cortical representation row B were found only in layer IV (41%). The changes were not observed in animals, that received whisker stimulation alone or in those who were subjected to training with unpaired stimuli. The results demonstrate that stimulus-pairing-induced changes in cortical whisker representation appeared with different time courses at different levels of cortical columnar information processing.
Department of Molecular and Cellular Neurobiology, Nencki Institute of Experimental Biology, ul. Pasteura 3, 02-093 Warsaw, Poland. e.siucinska@nencki.gov.pl
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D000818:Animals; D002540:Cerebral Cortex / Q000737:chemistry* / Q000502:physiology*; D003214:Conditioning, Classical / Q000502:physiology*; D003847:Deoxyglucose / Q000032:analysis*; D005260:Female; D008297:Male; D051379:Mice; D010812:Physical Stimulation / Q000379:methods; D014738:Vibrissae / Q000502:physiology*
D003847:Deoxyglucose