Differential effects of neonatal norepinephrine lesions on immediate early gene expression in developing and adult rat brain.

ABSTRACT: Activity regulated cytoskeletal protein (Arc), c-fos and zif268 are immediate early genes (IEGs) important for adult brain plasticity. We examined developmental expression of these IEGs and the effect of neonatal noradrenergic lesion on their expression in developing and mature brain. N-(2-chloroethyl)-N-ethyl-2-bromobenzylamine hydrochloride (DSP-4), a specific noradrenergic neurotoxin, was administered to rats on postnatal day (PND) 3 and in situ hybridization was used to assay Arc, c-fos and zif268 mRNA on PND 13, 25 and 60. In contrast to decreases in Arc, c-fos and zif268 expression produced by noradrenergic lesions of mature brain, lesions on PND 3 yield a strikingly different effect. Neonatal lesions produce increases in c-fos and zif268 expression in specific frontal cortical layer

SUBMITTER: Sanders JD 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC2657358 | biostudies-literature | 2008 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature