Neural bases for the genesis and CO therapy of periodic Cheyne-Stokes breathing in neonatal male connexin-36 knockout mice.

Periodic Cheyne-Stokes breathing (CSB) oscillating between apnea and crescendo-decrescendo hyperpnea is the most common central apnea. Currently, there is no proven therapy for CSB, probably because the fundamental pathophysiological question of how the respiratory center generates this form of breathing instability is still unresolved. Therefore, we aimed to determine the respiratory motor pattern of CSB resulting from the interaction of inspiratory and expiratory oscillators and identify the neural mechanism responsible for breathing regularization induced by the supplemental CO administration.

Respiratory disturbances and high risk of sudden death in the neonatal connexin-36 knockout mouse.

Neural circuits at the brainstem involved in the central generation of the motor patterns of respiration and cardiorespiratory chemoreflexes organize as cell assemblies connected by chemical and electrical synapses. However, the role played by the electrical connectivity mainly mediated by connexin36 (Cx36), which expression reaches peak value during the postnatal period, is still unknown. To address this issue, we analyzed here the respiratory phenotype of a mouse strain devoid constitutively of Cx36 at P14.