Center for Neuron and Disease, Frontier Institutes of Science and Technology, Xi'an Jiaotong University, Xi'an, China.
Department of Physiology, University of Toronto, 1 King's College Circle, Toronto, Ontario, Canada.
Mol Brain. 2020 Mar 16;13(1):41. doi: 10.1186/s13041-020-00583-8.
Sex differences in certain types of pain sensitivity and emotional responses have been previously reported. Synaptic plasticity is a key cellular mechanism for pain perception and emotional regulation, including long-term potentiation (LTP) and long-term depression (LTD). However, it is unclear whether there is a sex difference at synaptic level. Recent studies indicate that excitatory transmission and plasticity in the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) are critical in chronic pain and pain related emotional responses. In the present study, we used 64-channel multielectrode (MED64) system to record synaptic plasticity in the ACC of male and female adult mice. We found that there was no significant difference in theta-burst stimulation (TBS)-induced LTP between female and male mice. Furthermore, the recruitment of inactive channels was also not different. For LTD, we found that LTD was greater in slices of ACC in male mice than female mice. Our results demonstrate that LTP in the ACC does not show any sex-related difference.
先前已有研究报道，某些类型的疼痛敏感性和情绪反应存在性别差异。突触可塑性是疼痛感知和情绪调节的关键细胞机制，包括长时程增强（LTP）和长时程抑制（LTD）。然而，突触水平是否存在性别差异尚不清楚。最近的研究表明，前扣带皮层（ACC）中的兴奋性传递和可塑性对于慢性疼痛和与疼痛相关的情绪反应至关重要。在本研究中，我们使用 64 通道多电极（MED64）系统记录了雄性和雌性成年小鼠 ACC 中的突触可塑性。我们发现，TBS 诱导的 LTP 在雌性和雄性小鼠之间没有显著差异。此外，不活动通道的募集也没有差异。对于 LTD，我们发现雄性小鼠的 ACC 切片中的 LTD 大于雌性小鼠。我们的研究结果表明，ACC 中的 LTP 没有表现出任何与性别相关的差异。
