title: Prenatal choline supplementation alters the timing, emotion, and memory performance (TEMP) of adult male and female rats as indexed by differential reinforcement of low-rate schedule behavior.
abstract: Choline availability in the maternal diet has a lasting effect on brain and behavior of the offspring. To further delineate the impact of early nutritional status, we examined effects of prenatal-choline supplementation on timing, emotion, and memory performance of adult male and female rats. Rats that were given sufficient choline (CON: 1.1 g/kg) or supplemental choline (SUP: 5.0 g/kg) during embryonic days (ED) 12-17 were trained with a differential reinforcement of low-rate (DRL) schedule that was gradually transitioned through 5-, 10-, 18-, 36-, and 72-sec criterion times. We observed that SUP-females emitted more reinforced responses than CON-females, which were more efficient than both groups of males. In addition, SUP-males and SUP-females exhibited a reduction in burst responding (response latencies <2 sec) compared with both groups of CON rats. Furthermore, despite a reduced level of burst responding, the SUP-males made more nonreinforced responses prior to the DRL criterion as a result of maintaining the previous DRL criterion following transition to a new criterion. In summary, long-lasting effects of prenatal-choline supplementation were exhibited by reduced frustrative DRL responding in conjunction with the persistence of temporal memory in SUP-males and enhanced temporal exploration and response efficiency in SUP-females.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology and Neuroscience, Duke University, Genome Sciences Research Building II, Durham, North Carolina 27708, USA.
authors.forename: Ruey-Kuang
authors.initials: RK
authors.lastname: Cheng
authors.forename: Christopher J
authors.initials: CJ
authors.lastname: MacDonald
authors.forename: Christina L
authors.initials: CL
authors.lastname: Williams
authors.forename: Warren H
authors.initials: WH
authors.lastname: Meck
mesh_terms: D000367:Age Factors; D000818:Animals; D001522:Behavior, Animal / Q000502:physiology; D001921:Brain / Q000187:drug effects* / Q000196:embryology*; D002794:Choline / Q000494:pharmacology*; D003213:Conditioning, Psychological / Q000502:physiology; D019587:Dietary Supplements; D004644:Emotions / Q000502:physiology; D005260:Female; D008297:Male; D008568:Memory / Q000502:physiology; D018697:Nootropic Agents / Q000494:pharmacology*; D011247:Pregnancy; D011297:Prenatal Exposure Delayed Effects; D051381:Rats; D017207:Rats, Sprague-Dawley; D011930:Reaction Time / Q000502:physiology; D012055:Reinforcement Schedule; D012727:Sex Characteristics
chemical_list: D018697:Nootropic Agents; D002794:Choline