Synaptic plasticity preserved with arachidonic acid diet in aged rats.
Susumu Kotani a,b , Hiroe Nakazawa a , Takayuki Tokimasa a,1 , Kengo Akimoto c , Hiroshi Kawashima d , Yoshiko Toyoda-Ono c , Yoshinobu Kiso c , Hiroshige Okaichi e , and Manabu Sakakibara b,*
Neuroscience Research 46 (2003) 453/461
a Department of Physiology, School of Medicine, Tokai University, Isehara 259-1193, Japan
b Laboratory of Neurobiological Engineering, School of High-Technology for Human Welfare, Tokai University, 317 Nishino Numazu 410-0321, Shizuoka, Japan
c Institute of Health Care Science SUNTORY Ltd, Shimamoto 618-8503, Osaka, Japan
d Process Development Department SUNTORY Ltd, Shimamoto 618-8503, Osaka, Japan
e Department of Psychology, Doshisha University, Kyoto 602-8580, Japan
We examined whether synaptic plasticity was preserved in aged rats administered an arachidonic acid (AA) containing diet. Young male Fischer-344 rats (2 mo of age), and two groups of aged rats of the same strain (2 y of age) who consumed either a control diet or an AA ethyl ester-containing diet for at least 3 mo were used. In the Morris water maze task, aged rats on the AA diet had tendency to show better performance than aged rats on the control diet. Long-term potentiation induced by tetanic stimulation was recorded from a 300 mm thick hippocampal slice with a 36 multi-electrode-array positioned at the dendrites of CA1 pyramidal neurons. The degree of potentiation after 1 h in aged rats on the AA diet was comparable as that of young controls. Phospholipid analysis revealed that AA and docosahexaenoic acid were the major fatty acids in the hippocampus in aged rats. There was a correlation between the behavioral measure and the changes in excitatory postsynaptic potential slope and between the physiologic measure and the total amount of AA in hippocampus.
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