Environmental enrichment decreases GABAergic inhibition and improves cognitive abilities, synaptic plasticity, and visual functions in a mouse model of Down syndrome.
Down syndrome (DS) is the most common genetic disorder associated with mental retardation. It has been repeatedly shown that Ts65Dn mice, the prime animal model for DS, have severe cognitive and neural plasticity defects due to excessive inhibition. We report that increasing sensory-motor stimulation in adulthood through environmental enrichment (EE) reduces brain inhibition levels and promotes recovery of spatial memory abilities, hippocampal synaptic plasticity, and visual functions in adult Ts65Dn mice.
Laboratory of Neurobiology, Scuola Normale Superiore Pisa, Italy.
Tatjana
T
Begenisic
Maria
M
Spolidoro
Chiara
C
Braschi
Laura
L
Baroncelli
Marco
M
Milanese
Gianluca
G
Pietra
Maria E
ME
Fabbri
Giambattista
G
Bonanno
Giovanni
G
Cioni
Lamberto
L
Maffei
Alessandro
A
Sale