Ketamine blocks a taste recognition memory in fetal rats

Prenatal exposure to vanilla or alcohol induces crawling after these odors in the neonate rat: The role of mu and kappa opioid receptor systems

Rat fetuses can perceive chemosensory stimuli derived from their mother's diet, and they may learn about those stimuli. In previous studies we have observed that prenatal exposure to alcohol during the last days of gestation increases the acceptance and liking of an alcohol flavor in infant and adolescent rats. While these results were not found after prenatal exposure to vanilla, cineole or anise, suggesting that the pharmacological properties of alcohol, mediated by the opioid system, underlie the effects observed with this drug. Considering that other studies report enhanced acceptance of non-alcohol flavors experienced prenatally when subjects were tested before infancy, we explore the possibility of observing similar results if testing 1-day old rats exposed prenatally to vanilla. Using an "odor-induced crawling" testing procedure, it was observed that neonates exposed prenatally to vanilla or alcohol crawl for a longer distance towards the experienced odor than to other odors or than control pups. Blocking mu, but not kappa opioid receptors, reduced the attraction of vanilla odor to neonates exposed to vanilla in utero, while the response to alcohol in pups exposed prenatally to this drug was affected by both antagonists. Results confirm that exposure to a non-alcohol odor enhances postnatal responses to it, observable soon after birth, while also suggesting that the mu opioid receptor system plays an important role in generating this effect. The results also imply that with alcohol exposure, the prenatal opioid system is wholly involved, which could explain the longer retention of the enhanced attraction to alcohol following prenatal experience with the drug.

Corticosterone and propranolol's role on taste recognition memory

Taste recognition is a robust procedure to study learning and memory processes, as well as the different stages involved in them, i.e. encoding, storage and recall. Considerable evidence indicates that adrenal hormones and the noradrenergic system play an important role in aversive and appetitive memory formation in rats and humans. The present experiments were designed to characterize the effects of immediate post training corticosterone (Experiment 1) and propranolol administration (Experiment 2 and 3) on taste recognition memory. Administration of a high dose of corticosterone (5mg/kg, sc) impairs consolidation of taste memory, but the low and moderate doses (1 and 3mg/kg, sc) didn't affect it. On the other hand, immediate post-training administration of propranolol (1 and 2mg/kg, ip) impaired taste recognition memory. These effects were time-dependent since no effects were seen when drug administration was delayed 3h after training. These findings support the importance of stress hormones and noradrenergic system on the modulation of taste memory consolidation.

Behavioral effects of prenatal ketamine exposure in rhesus macaques are dependent on MAOA genotype

Ketamine is an N-methyl-D-aspartate (NMDA) receptor antagonist that is used in anesthetic, abuse, and therapeutic contexts. Recent evidence suggests that ketamine may affect not only glutamate systems, but may also act on receptors in the dopamine and serotonin systems. Because monoamine neurotransmitters play important trophic roles in prenatal development, we hypothesized that the behavioral consequences of prenatal exposure to ketamine may be moderated by genotype of the promoter in the monoamine oxidase-A (MAOA) gene. Eighty-two infant rhesus monkeys were identified that had known dates of conception and exposures to ketamine during gestation. Animals were tested at 3-4 months of age on a battery of tests assessing responsiveness to maternal separation, recognition memory, and contact with novel objects. Animals were classified by putative activity levels for the MAOA genotype. The effects of prenatal ketamine exposure were seen only in the context of MAOA genotype. Greater exposure to ketamine resulted in increased activity, less willingness to perform in the memory task, and reduced emotionality and novel-object contact, but only for individuals with the low-activity genotype. Nearly all effects of ketamine were the result of first- and second-trimester exposure. MAOA genotype moderates the role of prenatal ketamine exposure at time points in gestation earlier than have been shown in past research, and is particularly evident for measures of emotionality. These results support the idea that ketamine's use might be best considered in light of individuals' genetic characteristics.

Infant with in utero ketamine exposure: quantitative measurement of residual dosage in hair

BACKGROUND

The drug ketamine is frequently abused for recreational use in Asia, but few studies in humans have focused on the effects of ketamine exposure during pregnancy on the health of neonates. Here, we report a neonate whose mother was suspected of ketamine abuse during pregnancy. The case was confirmed by testing hair samples of the neonate.

METHODS

Hair samples of the neonate were taken on the first day of referral. Levels of common drugs of abuse in Asia were measured in the hair sample by gas chromatography-mass spectrometry using our previously reported method with modifications. This method was developed and validated to simultaneously quantify levels of amphetamine, ketamine and opiate in human hair.

RESULTS

The neonate was a female baby, born full term, with a low birth weight of 2250 g. Very high levels of ketamine were detected in the neonate's hair, even though the mother stated that she had stopped abusing ketamine during the early stage of pregnancy. The neonate suffered from general hypotonia; moderate cerebral dysfunction was found by electroencephalography. Fortunately, her hypotonia improved gradually within 21 days.

CONCLUSION

This is the first report of ketamine exposure during late pregnancy detected by hair testing. We noted several clinical features in this case, including the infant being small for gestational age, intrauterine growth retardation, remarkable hypotonia, and poor reflex responses. Although the mother denied the use of ketamine during the late stage of her pregnancy, significant amount of ketamine and norketamine was still found in hair samples (only 2 cm long and 25 mg) from the infant.

Hyperphosphorylated tau in the brains of mice and monkeys with long-term administration of ketamine

Ketamine, a non-competitive antagonist at the glutamatergic N-methyl-d-aspartate (NMDA) receptor, might impair memory function of the brain. Loss of memory is also a characteristic of aging and Alzheimer's disease. Hyperphosphorylation of tau is an early event in the aging process and Alzheimer's disease. Therefore, we aimed to find out whether long-term ketmaine administration is related to hyperphosphorylation of tau or not in the brains of mice and monkeys. Results showed that after 6 months' administration of ketamine, in the prefrontal and entorhinal cortical sections of mouse and monkey brains, there were significant increases of positive sites for the hyperphosphorylated tau protein as compared to the control animals receiving no ketamine administration. Furthermore, about 15% of hyperphosphorylated tau positive cells were also positively labeled by terminal dUTP nick end labeling (TUNEL) indicating there might be a relationship between hyperphosphorylation of tau and apoptosis. Therefore, the long-term ketamine toxicity might involve neurodegenerative process similar to that of aging and/or Alzheimer's disease.

Ketamine blocks the formation of a gustatory memory trace in rats

N-methyl-D-aspartate (NMDA) receptors appear to play a central role in learning and memory processes, as the administration of antagonistic substances of these receptors hinders learning acquisition by using different behavioral paradigms (e.g., Riedel G, Platt B, Micheau J. Glutamate receptor function in learning and memory. Behavioural Brain Research, 2003;140 (1-2):1-47.). In the specific case of conditioned taste aversion, the administration of ketamine seems to affect the acquisition of conditioning when the drugs are administered before the experimental treatment. In this paper we present three experiments designed to analyze the effect of different ketamine doses (25 mg/kg, 50 mg/kg, 75 mg/kg and 120 mg/kg), administered between exposure to a taste (the conditioned stimulus) and the administration of the unconditioned stimulus, on the acquisition of a taste aversion association. The results reveal that higher ketamine doses (75 mg/kg and 120 mg/kg) have a disruptive effect on conditioned taste aversion by impeding the formation of the gustatory trace.

Ketamine affects memory consolidation: Differential effects in T-maze and passive avoidance paradigms in mice

The effects of ketamine, an N-methyl-D-aspartate (NMDA) antagonist, on memory in animals have been limited to the sub-anesthetic dose given prior to training in previous studies. We evaluated the effects of post-training anesthetic doses of ketamine to selectively manipulate memory consolidation, and the effect of pre-retention sub-anesthetic doses of ketamine on memory retrieval in passive avoidance and T-maze tasks in mice. Repeated post-training anesthetic doses of ketamine impaired the consolidation of memory in the T-maze but not in passive avoidance paradigms. This impairment was not permanent but diminished 1-2 days after ketamine withdrawal. Sub-anesthetic post-training doses of ketamine (5 mg/kg) had no effect on memory consolidation, and larger doses (10, 20 and 50 mg/kg) did not influence the retrieval of memory in the T-maze. The data suggest that repeated anesthetic doses of ketamine block NMDA receptors and affect memory consolidation. Moreover, NMDA mechanisms antagonized by ketamine appear to be selectively involved in spatial (T-maze) memory mechanisms but may not be necessary for non-spatial (passive avoidance) memory consolidation.

Metabotropic glutamate receptor antagonists but not NMDA antagonists affect conditioned taste aversion acquisition in the parabrachial nucleus of rats

The effect of glutamate receptor antagonists on conditioned taste aversion (CTA) was studied in rats. The association of the short-term memory of a gustatory conditioned stimulus (CS) with visceral malaise (unconditioned stimulus, US) in the CTA paradigm takes place in the parabrachial nuclei (PBN) of the brainstem. The first direct evidence of participation of glutamatergic neurotransmission in the PBN during CTA demonstrated that the extracellular level of glutamate rises during saccharin drinking (Bielavska et al. in Brain Res 887:413-417, 2000). Our results show an effect of microdialysis administration of selective GluR antagonists into the PBN on the formation of CTA engram. We used four glutamate receptor (GluR) antagonists of different types (D-AP5, MK-801 as antagonists of ionotropic GluR and L-AP3, MSPG as antagonists of metabotropic GluR). The disruptive effect of MK-801 on CTA formation in the PBN is concentration-dependent, with the greatest inhibition under the higher concentrations eliciting significant disruption. The application of D-AP5 (0.1, 1, 5 mM) did not elicit a statistically significant blockade of CTA acquisition. This indicates that the association of the US-CS in the PBN is not dependent on NMDA receptors. On the contrary, application of L-AP3 (0.1, 1, 5 mM) blocked the CS-US association.

Neurofunctional deficits and potentiated apoptosis by neonatal NMDA antagonist administration

The early postnatal brain development, when many potentially sensitive processes occur, has been shown to be vulnerable to different pharmacological and environmental compounds. In the present investigation, four groups of neonatal NMRI male mice were administered the glutamate NMDA receptor antagonist ketamine (50 mg/kg, s.c.), or the GABA(A) receptor agonist diazepam (5 mg/kg, s.c.), or co-administered ketamine (50 mg/kg, s.c.) and diazepam (5 mg/kg, s.c.), or vehicle (0.9% saline, s.c.) on day 10 after birth. On day 11, mice from each treatment group were sacrificed and brains were taken for analysis of neuronal cell degeneration, using Fluoro-Jade staining technique. Ketamine, but not diazepam, induced a severe degeneration of cells in the parietal cortex. The opposite was observed for diazepam in the laterodorsal thalamus. The most pronounced cell degeneration was seen in parietal cortex of mice exposed to both ketamine and diazepam. At 2 months of age each treatment group was tested for motor activity and learning performance. Ketamine and ketamine + diazepam treated mice displayed severe deficits of habituation to the test chamber in the spontaneous motor activity test, marked deficits of acquisition learning and retention memory in the radial arm maze-learning task and less shift learning in the circular swim maze-learning task. This study indicates that the observed functional deficits can be related to cell degeneration induced during a critical stage of neonatal brain development. The potentiated apoptosis induced by ketamine and diazepam may have implications for the selection of drugs used in neonatal paediatric anaesthesia.

Long-term age-dependent behavioral changes following a single episode of fetal N-methyl-D-Aspartate (NMDA) receptor blockade

Background

Administration of the N-methyl-D-aspartate (NMDA) antagonist ketamine during the perinatal period can produce a variety of behavioral and neuroanatomical changes. Our laboratory has reported reliable changes in learning and memory following a single dose of ketamine administered late in gestation. However, the nature of the drug-induced changes depends on the point during embryonic development when ketamine is administered. Embryonic day 18 (E18) rat fetuses pre-treated with ketamine (100 mg/kg, i.p. through the maternal circulation) and taught a conditioned taste aversion (CTA) learn and remember the CTA, whereas E19 fetuses do not. The current study sought to determine if long-term behavioral effects could be detected in animals that received ketamine or a saline control injection on either E18 or E19. Rat behavior was evaluated on two different measures: spontaneous locomotion and water maze learning. Measurements were collected during 2 periods: Juvenile test period [pre-pubertal locomotor test: Postnatal Day 11 (P11); pre-pubertal water maze test: P18] or Young-adult test period [post-pubertal locomotor test: P60; post-pubertal water maze test: P81].

Results

Water maze performance of ketamine-treated rats was similar to that of controls when tested on P18. Likewise, the age of the animal at the time of ketamine/saline treatment did not influence learning of the maze. However, the young-adult water maze test (P81) revealed reliable benefits of prenatal ketamine exposure – especially during the initial re-training trial. On the first trial of the young adult test, rats treated with ketamine on E18 reached the hidden platform faster than any other group – including rats treated with ketamine on E19. Swim speeds of experimental and control rats were not significantly different. Spontaneous horizontal locomotion measured during juvenile testing indicated that ketamine-treated rats were less active than controls. However, later in development, rats treated with ketamine on E18 were more active than rats that received the drug on E19.

Conclusion

These data suggest that both the day in fetal development when ketamine is administered and the timing of post-natal behavioral testing interact to influence behavioral outcomes. The data also indicate that the paradoxical age-dependent effects of early ketamine treatment on learning, previously described in fetuses and neonates, may also be detected later in young adult rats.

Repeated exposures to gustatory stimuli produce habituation or positive contrast effects in perinatal rats

Adult rats exhibit a decrease in consummatory responses following repeated presentations of a taste (habituation) and an increase in consummatory responses if they experience an upward shift in the magnitude or intensity of a gustatory stimulus (e.g., sucrose or saccharin). These responses do not represent a direct sensorimotor reaction to a gustatory cue, but rather reflect a change in responding based on the memory of a previous taste. Here, we sought to determine if fetal rats could (like adults) adjust their orofacial motor responses based on a memory of recent gustatory experience. Embryonic Day 18 (E18) or Day 19 (E19) rat fetuses received oral lavage with either 0.15 or 0.30% saccharin (SAC). Subsequently, observations of orofacial movements (mouthing and licking) following oral lavage with 0.30% SAC were made 50 min later, 24 hr later, or on postnatal Day 3 (P3). Thus, some animals were in a "shifted" condition in which they first experienced a relatively low concentration of SAC and then a higher one while control rats ("nonshifted") received 0.30% SAC during both taste exposures. Fetuses exhibited evidence of both habituation (with repeated presentation of the 0.30% SAC) and positive contrast effects (PCEs) (following an upward shift in SAC concentration) when retested 50 min after their first exposure to SAC on E19. However, these animals did not exhibit PCEs 24 hr later or 5 days later (on P3). Contrast effects were not observed when the initial SAC exposure was on E18, and habituation responses were variable depending on the time interval between the taste presentations to these animals. Rats with a 5- to 6-day latency between the two taste presentations showed neither PCEs nor habituation. Our data indicate that PCEs and habituation effects emerge at different ages, and their demonstration is dependent upon the latency between the taste presentations.

Neurobehavioural deficits associated with apoptotic neurodegeneration and vulnerability for ADHD

Several studies involving postnatal administration of the N-methyl-D-aspartate (NMDA) antagonists, dizocilpine (MK-801; 3 x 0.5 mg/kg, at 08.00, 16.00 and 24.00 h) on Postnatal day 11, or Ketamine (1 x 50 mg/kg) or Ethanol (1 x 2.5 g/kg, Ethanol-Low, or 2 x 2.5 g/kg, 2-h interval, Ethanol-High) on Postnatal day 10, are described. Some mice from each treatment/vehicle group were sacrificed 24 h after NMDA antagonist treatment and brain regions were taken for fluoro-jade staining analysis. Functional analysis was initiated at 60 days of age. All three treatments inducing an antagonistic action at NMDA receptors, MK-801, Ketamine and Ethanol-High induced a similar pattern of initial hypoactivity followed by marked and lasting hyperactivity in the motor activity test chambers. In each case, the basal hyperactivity level was abolished by acute treatment with a low dose of D-amphetamine (0.25 mg/kg). All three treatments, MK-801, Ketamine and Ethanol-High, induced a deficit in acquisitive performance in the radial arm maze test of instrumental learning. The deficit induced by postnatal MK-801 was abolished by acute treatment with the low dose of D-amphetamine. All three treatments, MK-801, Ketamine and Ethanol-High, resulted in normal acquisitive performance during the first three test days in the circular swim with the submerged platform maintained in a constant position, but on the fourth test day, with the platform position shifted to a different "quadrant", induced marked deficits. Fluoro-jade staining analyses indicated a devastating cell degeneration in several brain regions of mice administered NMDA antagonists postnatally, including the hippocampus, frontal cortex, parietal cortex, and cerebellum. Severe cell degeneration in the laterodorsal thalamus due to Ethanol or diazepam (5 mg/kg) appeared not to affect the different aspects of function. The pattern of dysfunctional outcome and apoptotic cell loss following postnatal NMDA antagonist treatment offers a plausible similarity to the major aspects of 'syndromatic continuity' in ADHD, hyperactivity, inattention and impulsivity, thereby providing an interesting animal model of the disorder.

Hyperactivity following postnatal NMDA antagonist treatment: reversal by D-amphetamine

Three experiments were performed to study the effects of neonatal administration of glutamate receptor antagonists, on either Day 11 (dizocilpine = MK-801, 3 x 0.5 mg/kg, s.c., injected at 0800, 1600 and 2400 h) or Day 10 (Ketamine, 1 x 50 mg/kg, s.c., or Ethanol-Low, 1 x 2.5 mg/kg, or, Ethanol-High, 2 x 2.5 mg/kg, s.c., with 2-h interval) to male mice pups, on spontaneous motor behavior, habituation to a novel situation and D-amphetamine-induced activity in the adult animals. Mice administered MK-801 showed initial hypoactivity followed by hyperactivity over the later (20-40 and 40-60 min) periods of testing. Mice administered Ketamine and Ethanol-High similarly displayed an initial hypoactivity followed by hyperactivity over the later time (20-60 min) of testing. Habituation to the novel activity test chambers was reduced drastically in the MK-801 mice compared with vehicle-treated mice. Similarly, mice administered Ketamine and Ethanol-High displayed too drastically reduced habituation behavior. The low dose of D-amphetamine (0.25 mg/kg) reduced the hyperactivity of neonatal MK-801-treated mice, particularly from 30-60 min onwards, and elevated the activity level of the vehicle-treated mice. Similarly, the low dose of D-amphetamine (0.25 mg/kg) reduced the hyperactivity of neonatally Ketamine-treated and Ethanol-High-treated mice, particularly from 30-60 min onwards, and elevated the activity level of the respective vehicle-treated mice. Fluoro-jade staining per mm(2) regional brain tissue of MK-801 mice pups expressed as percent of vehicle mice pups showed also that the extensiveness of staining was markedly greater in the parietal cortex, hippocampus, frontal cortex, and lesser so in the laterodorsal thalamus. Ketamine-treated mice showed cell degeneration mainly in the parietal cortex, whereas the Ethanol-High mice showed marked cell degeneration in both the parietal and laterodorsal cortex. The present findings that encompass a pattern of regional neuronal degeneration, disruptions of spontaneous motor activity, habituation deficits and reversal of hyperactivity by a low dose of D-amphetamine suggest a model of Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder that underlines the intimate role of N-methyl-D-aspartate (NMDA) receptors in the developing brain.