Interactions between radiation and amphetamine in taste-aversion learning and the role of the area postrema in amphetamine-induced conditioned taste aversions

Technical Report · Thu Jan 01 00:00:00 EST 1987

OSTI ID:5068658

Rabin, B M; Hunt, W A; Lee, J

Three experiments were run to assess the role of the area postrema in taste-aversion learning resulting from combined treatment with subthreshold unconditioned stimuli and in the acquisition of an amphetamine-induced taste aversion. In the first experiment, it was shown that combined treatment with subthreshold radiation (15 rad) and subthreshold amphetamine (0.5 mg/kg, IP) resulted in the acquisition of a taste aversion. The second experiment showed that lesions of the area postrema blocked taste aversion learning produced by two subthreshold doses of amphetamine. In the third experiment, which looked at the dose-response curve for amphetamine-induced taste aversion learning to intact rats and rats with area postrema lesions, it was shown that both groups of rats acquired taste aversions following injection of amphetamine, although the rats with lesions showed a less-severe aversion than the intact rats. The results are interpreted as indicating that amphetamine-induced taste-aversion learning may involve area post-remamediated mechanisms, particularly at the lower doses, but an intact area postrema is not a necessary condition of the acquisition of an amphetamine-induced taste aversion.

• Research Organization: Armed Forces Radiobiology Research Inst., Bethesda, MD (USA)
• OSTI ID: 5068658
• Report Number(s): AD-A-186487/5/XAB; AFFRI-SR-87-30
• Resource Relation: Other Information: Pub. in Pharmacology Biochemistry and Behavior, Vol. 27, 677-683(1987)
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

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