Effects of intraseptal injections of L-glutamate and GABA on the rat's acoustic startle response

Elabanjo, Olusola A. (1986) Effects of intraseptal injections of L-glutamate and GABA on the rat's acoustic startle response. Masters thesis, Memorial University of Newfoundland.

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Abstract

The specific hypothesis that cell bodies in the medial septum-diagonal band (MS-DB) complex are responsible for startle amplitude modulation was tested in rats using L-glutamate and GABA as the cell-specific excitant and inhibitor respectively. -- In a series of experiments, various concentrations and volumes of L-glutamate and GABA were injected into the MS-DB complex, and the startle amplitude measured by administering 80 trials of 70 db white noise background and 110 db white noise, as the startle stimulus. L-glutamate studies revealed that injection of 1 , μ1, 1 M, significantly attenuated the rat's acoustic startle response(ASR), while the GABA studies showed no difference from the control groups. The results were interpreted to have indicated that the cell bodies in the MS-DB complex are involved in the attenuation of the rat's startle amplitude, while the failure of GABA to achieve the opposite effect was probably due to its uptake and/or conversion to glutamate. -- Hippocampal EEG recording taken from the rats injected with L-glutamate and GABA showed that the effects seen in the present studies were not due to the injected drugs causing epileptiform-like discharges in the hippocampus. -- Key words: Acoustic startle response (ASR); EEG; GABA; Hippocampus; Intraseptal; L-GLUT; MSB; Septo-hippocampal; Picrotoxin.

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