Abdel Baki Samah G, Kao Hsin-Yi, Kelemen Eduard, Fenton André A, Bergold Peter J
Department of Physiology and Pharmacology, State University of New York-Downstate Medical Center, Brooklyn, NY 11203, USA.
Brain Res. 2009 Jul 14;1280:98-106. doi: 10.1016/j.brainres.2009.05.034. Epub 2009 May 21.
Behavioral analysis commonly assesses cognitive deficits in rodents following traumatic brain injury (TBI). We examined rats that received sham, mild or moderate injury in the controlled cortical impact model of TBI. The rats were tested in a novel hierarchy of four behavioral tasks with increasing cognitive demand. All three groups had similar performance on the first two phases of training: open field exploration and passive place avoidance using a stationary shock zone on a non-rotating arena. The similar performance on the first two tasks suggested comparable sensory, motor skills and contextual memory in all three groups. In phase three, rats were tested on active place avoidance, their ability to avoid a stationary shock zone on the rotating arena. Control and mildly-injured rats learned this task within four ten-minute trials while moderately-injured animals were impaired. Moderately-injured animals were also impaired if tested 3 weeks after injury. One day after phase three, sham- and mildly-injured animals were tested on a phase four conflict active avoidance task with the shock zone shifted 180 degrees from its phase three location and mildly-injured animals were impaired. The speed in which the animals complete the four phases of testing as well as the ability to discriminate between differing injury severity suggests that this set of neurobehavioral tasks will be useful to understand cognitive deficits underlying TBI as well as a useful screening method for therapeutic drugs.
行为分析通常用于评估创伤性脑损伤（TBI）后啮齿动物的认知缺陷。我们研究了在TBI的控制性皮质撞击模型中接受假手术、轻度或中度损伤的大鼠。这些大鼠在一系列认知需求逐渐增加的四项行为任务中接受测试。在训练的前两个阶段，所有三组大鼠的表现相似：旷场探索以及在非旋转竞技场中使用固定电击区进行被动位置回避。前两项任务的相似表现表明，所有三组大鼠在感觉、运动技能和情境记忆方面具有可比性。在第三阶段，对大鼠进行主动位置回避测试，即它们在旋转竞技场上避开固定电击区的能力。对照组和轻度损伤的大鼠在四次十分钟的试验中学会了这项任务，而中度损伤的动物则受损。如果在损伤后3周进行测试，中度损伤的动物也会受损。在第三阶段后的一天，对假手术组和轻度损伤的动物进行第四阶段冲突主动回避任务测试，电击区从第三阶段的位置偏移180度，轻度损伤的动物受损。动物完成四个测试阶段的速度以及区分不同损伤严重程度的能力表明，这组神经行为任务将有助于理解TBI潜在的认知缺陷，也是一种有用的治疗药物筛选方法。
