Maze training alters brain weights and cortical RNA/DNA ratios

Journal Article · Mon Jan 01 00:00:00 EST 1979 · Behav. Neural Biol.; (United States)

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1016/S0163-1047(79)92842-5· OSTI ID:6598759

Bennett, E L ^[1]; Rosenzweig, M R; Morimoto, H; Hebert, M

---

1. Lawrence Berkeley Lab., CA

In order to test whether training leads to anatomical and chemical changes in the brain, individual rats were given self-paced trials in mazes, traversing the maze in order to get from a food station to a water station. In 30 days of this training, during which they had no social interaction, the rats developed significant increases in weight and RNA/DNA of standard samples of cerebral cortex, as compared with littermate rats in either of two control conditions: (a) rats confined to small individual cages (N = 70 per condition); (b) rats that traversed the empty maze box with no maze barriers present (N = 29 per condition). Whereas the rats who faced maze problems decreased average transit times through the maze on successive trials, the rats that traversed the empty box showed no regular trend in running times over trials. The cerebral effects of maze experience versus control conditions were similar in pattern but were smaller in magnitude than effects of experience in a social group in a multisensory complex environment. This clear evidence of cerebral changes as consequences of maze training adds further support to the indications that similar cerebral changes resulting from enriched experience are due to learning rather than to other factors. The changes that follow training or enriched experience can be linked with other evidence concerning the roles of RNA and of protein synthesis in the formation of long-term memory traces.

• OSTI ID: 6598759
• Journal Information: Behav. Neural Biol.; (United States), Vol. 26
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

59 BASIC BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES
BRAIN
BIOCHEMISTRY
MORPHOLOGY
LEARNING
ANATOMY
BEHAVIOR
BIOLOGICAL EFFECTS
CEREBRAL CORTEX
CONDITIONED REFLEXES
DNA
MORPHOLOGICAL CHANGES
PATHOLOGICAL CHANGES
RATS
RNA
WEIGHT MEASUREMENT
ANIMALS
BODY
CENTRAL NERVOUS SYSTEM
CEREBRUM
CHEMISTRY
MAMMALS
NERVOUS SYSTEM
NUCLEIC ACIDS
ORGANIC COMPOUNDS
ORGANS
REFLEXES
RODENTS
VERTEBRATES
550100* - Behavioral Biology
550200 - Biochemistry
550800 - Morphology