Details

Autor(en) / Beteiligte

• Scalera, Giuseppe
• Grigson, Patricia Sue
• Norgren, Ralph
• Gallagher, Michela

Titel

Gustatory Functions, Sodium Appetite, and Conditioned Taste Aversion Survive Excitotoxic Lesions of the Thalamic Taste Area

Ist Teil von

• Behavioral neuroscience, 1997-06, Vol.111 (3), p.633-645

Ort / Verlag

Washington, DC: American Psychological Association

Erscheinungsjahr

1997

Quelle

MEDLINE

Beschreibungen/Notizen

• Rats with bilateral, electrophysiologically guided, ibotenic acid lesions of the gustatory thalamus (THLX) were tested for their ability to perform a variety of taste-guided behaviors. First, in daily 30-min sessions, the rats were given repeated 10-s access periods to a range of concentrations of sucrose, NaCl, or QHCl, plus water. Both the control and the THLX rats exhibited similar concentration-response functions, regardless of hydrational state. Next, on 3 trials, the rats were given 15 min access to 0.3 M l -alanine and then injected with LiCl (0.15 M, 1.33 ml/100 g body weight ip). All rats learned a taste aversion following 1 pairing with LiCl. Finally, on 3 separate occasions, the rats were injected with furosemide, and Na + -appetite was evaluated 24 hr later. All rats expressed an equivalent sodium appetite after the first furosemide injection, but only the control rats increased intake of 0.51 M NaCl with repeated sodium depletions. These observations reinforce prior data implying that an intact gustatory thalamus is not necessary for the expression of some taste-guided behaviors.