Behavioral effects of intracerebroventricular microinfusion of agmatine in adult rats.
The present study investigated the behavioral effects of intracerebroventricular microinfusion of agmatine. Rats with low dose (10 microg), but not high dose (100 microg), of agmatine spent significantly less time in the enclosed arm and more time in the open arm in the elevated plus maze. In the water maze task, the high dose group displayed a transient impairment in searching for a hidden platform, whereas the low dose group had reduced latency in the first probe test. In the object recognition task, all groups could detect the novel object, but the low dose group spent significantly more time exploring displaced objects. Furthermore, the low dose group made significantly fewer errors in the working, but not the reference, memory version of the radial arm maze task. These results suggest that the behavioral effects of agmatine are task- and dose-dependent, and agmatine may be an anxiolytic and memory modulator.
Department of Anatomy and Structural Biology, School of Medical Sciences, University of Otago, Dunedin, New Zealand. ping.liu@stonebow.otago.ac.nz
Ping
P
Liu
Madihah
M
Rushaidhi
Nicola D
ND
Collie
Mei-Ting
MT
Leong
Hu
H
Zhang
D000376:Agmatine / Q000494:pharmacology*; D000704:Analysis of Variance; D000818:Animals; D001522:Behavior, Animal / Q000187:drug effects*; D004305:Dose-Response Relationship, Drug; D004333:Drug Administration Routes; D007276:Injections, Intraventricular / Q000379:methods; D008297:Male; D018782:Maze Learning / Q000187:drug effects; D008568:Memory / Q000187:drug effects; D010364:Pattern Recognition, Visual / Q000187:drug effects*; D051381:Rats; D017207:Rats, Sprague-Dawley; D011930:Reaction Time / Q000187:drug effects; D013997:Time Factors
D000376:Agmatine