Inactivation of medial prefrontal cortex or acute stress impairs odor span in rats.
The capacity of working memory is limited and is altered in brain disorders including schizophrenia. In rodent working memory tasks, capacity is typically not measured (at least not explicitly). One task that does measure working memory capacity is the odor span task (OST) developed by Dudchenko and colleagues. In separate experiments, the effects of medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) inactivation or acute stress on the OST were assessed in rats. Inactivation of the mPFC profoundly impaired odor span without affecting olfactory sensitivity. Acute stress also significantly reduced odor span. These findings support a potential role of the OST in developing novel therapeutics for disorders characterized by impaired working memory capacity.
Department of Physiology, University of Saskatchewan, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada S7N 5E5.
Don A
DA
Davies
Joel J
JJ
Molder
Quentin
Q
Greba
John G
JG
Howland
D000818:Animals; D003214:Conditioning, Classical / Q000187:drug effects / Q000502:physiology; D058785:GABA-A Receptor Agonists / Q000494:pharmacology; D008297:Male; D008570:Memory, Short-Term / Q000187:drug effects / Q000502:physiology; D009118:Muscimol / Q000494:pharmacology; D009812:Odorants; D000857:Olfaction Disorders / Q000209:etiology*; D017397:Prefrontal Cortex / Q000187:drug effects / Q000293:injuries / Q000502:physiology*; D051381:Rats; D020318:Rats, Long-Evans; D011930:Reaction Time / Q000187:drug effects / Q000502:physiology; D012201:Reward; D018709:Statistics, Nonparametric; D013315:Stress, Psychological / Q000150:complications*
D058785:GABA-A Receptor Agonists; D009118:Muscimol