The effects of apomorphine upon local cerebral glucose utilization in conscious rats and in rats anesthetized with chloral hydrate.

The effects of the dopaminergic agonist apomorphine (1 mg . kg-1 i.v.) upon local cerebral glucose utilization in 43 anatomically discrete regions of the CNS were examined in conscious, lightly restrained rats and in rats anesthetized with chloral hydrate by means of the quantitative autoradiographic [14C]2-deoxyglucose technique. In animals anesthetized with chloral hydrate, glucose utilization was reduced throughout all regions of the CNS from the levels observed in conscious animals, although the magnitude of the reductions in glucose use displayed considerable regional heterogeneity. With chloral hydrate anesthesia, the proportionately most marked reductions in glucose use (by 40-60% from conscious levels) were noted in primary auditory nuclei, thalmaic relay nuclei, and neocortex, and the least pronounced reductions in glucose use (by 15-25% from conscious levels) were observed in limbic areas, some motor relay nuclei, and white matter. In conscious, lightly restrained rats, the administration of apomorphine (1 mg . kg-1) effected significant increased in glucose utilization in 15 regions of the CNS (e.g., subthalamic nucleus, ventral thalamic nucleus, rostral neocortex, substantia nigra, pars reticulata), and significant reductions in glucose utilization in two regions of the CNS (lateral habenular nucleus and anterior cingulate cortex). In rats anesthetized with chloral hydrate, the effects of apomorphine upon local glucose utilization were less widespread and less marked than in conscious animals. In only two of the regions (the globus pallidus and septal nucleus), which displayed increased glucose use following apomorphine in conscious rats, were significant increases in local glucose utilization observed with this agent in chloral hydrate-anesthetized rats. In the pars compacta of the substantia nigra, in which apomorphine increased glucose utilization in conscious animals, significant reductions in glucose utilization were observed following apomorphine in rats anesthetized with chloral hydrate. The profound effects of chloral hydrate anesthesia upon local cerebral glucose use, and the modification by this anesthetic regime of the local metabolic responses to apomorphine, emphasize the difficulties which exists in the extrapolation of data from anesthetized animals to the conditions which prevail in the conscious animal.