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Behavioral differences on memory retrieval between two variants of step-through inhibitory avoidance task in mice.

Blake MG, Boccia MM, Baratti CM

Laboratorio de Neurofarmacología de los Procesos de Memoria, Cátedra de Farmacología, Facultad de Farmacia y Bioquímica, Universidad de Buenos Aires, Argentina. blakion@fmed.uba.ar

For several decades, one-trial inhibitory avoidance (IA) tasks have been used in the study of memory processing. In the present work, the effects of diazepam (DZP) (0.5mg/kg) and picrotoxin (PIC) (0.3mg/kg) on memory retrieval were assessed using two variants of a step-through IA situation in CF-1 mice. In the first variant, animals get into a dark compartment from an open illuminated platform (platform), whereas in the other, from an enclosed illuminated one (box). PIC impaired retention performance in the "platform-type" IA, but not in the "box-type". DZP enhanced retention performance in both types of IA task. These results evidence critical differences between the two step-through inhibitory avoidance tasks used, that might be relevant not only for retention performance during memory retrieval, but also for the theoretical interpretations and conclusions obtained from behavioral results.

Published 10 September 2008 in Neurosci Lett, 444(1): 102-5.
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