Role of the dorsal CA3 subregion of the brain and pattern completion in association with drug relapse

Update Item Information
Publication Type honors thesis
School or College Medicine
Department Neurosurgery
Creator Gupta, Isha
Title Role of the dorsal CA3 subregion of the brain and pattern completion in association with drug relapse
Date 2009-05
Description Drug relapse is a serious, social issue that requires extensive research in order to understand the mechanisms that precede relapse. Craving, the intense desire for a specific object or experience, is an important component of relapse. Drug-associated environmental cues (drug paraphernalia or locations where a drug was previously consumed) can elicit cravings and subsequently cause a return to previous behavior. Visual-spatial pattern completion (dorsal CA3 subregion of the hippocampus), a process wherein presentation of an incomplete stimulus complex reinstates the complete, previously learned pattern, is a novel mechanism to explain this observation. In this experiment, seven rats were handled daily for a week, following a baseline preference test (day 1). Rats were placed in one of two compartments of a Plexiglas box. Each compartment contained four different cues (two sets of cues). The non-preferred side was paired with cocaine (15mg/kg, intraperitoneal), while the preferred side was paired with phosphate buffered saline (lmL/kg, i.p). The order of the pairing (cocaine or saline first) was counterbalanced across treatment groups (days 2-9). Day 10 preference tests showed a strong preference for the cocaine-associated objects. Animals were then maintained for 21 days during abstinence. Four preference tests were given (days 32, 36, 40, 44) where animals were tested for one or four-cue environments with saline or naloxone (3mg/kg, i.p). The goal of this proposal was to use a variation of the conditioned place preference task to determine how the number of cues interacts with the role of visual-spatial pattern completion, and subsequently drug-seeking behavior. Also, the experiment sought to determine the effects of naloxone on cue-induced reinstatement. Results indicated that naloxone successfully disrupted visualspatial pattern completion for both one and four cues. Systemic injection is routinely used within the human population, and is a very accessible form of relapse prevention among recovering drug addicts.
Type Text
Publisher University of Utah
Subject Drug addiction; Pathophysiology
Language eng
Rights Management (c) Isha Gupta
Format Medium application/pdf
ARK ark:/87278/s6tr22vb
Setname ir_htca
ID 1714745
Reference URL https://collections.lib.utah.edu/ark:/87278/s6tr22vb