This chapter presents an optimized method for isolating synaptic vesicles (SVs) from neurospheres derived from human induced pluripotent stem cells (hiPSCs). The protocol begins with neurosphere cultivation to achieve mature neurons, which is essential for the functional studies of neuronal activity. Following this, neurosphere-derived synaptosomes are isolated, and SVs are enriched through differential centrifugation.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: Alteration of airway neuronal function and density and bidirectional interaction between immune cells and sensory peripheral nerves have been proposed to trigger and perpetuate inflammation that contribute to asthma severity. To date, few studies analysed neuroplasticity and neuroinflammation in tissue of asthmatic individuals. We hypothesized that the presence of these phenomena would be a pathological feature in fatal asthma.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFMicroglia are specialized immune cells that reside in the central nervous system (CNS) and play a crucial role in maintaining the homeostasis of the brain microenvironment. While traditionally regarded as a part of the innate immune system, recent research has highlighted their role in adaptive immunity. The CNS is no longer considered an immune-privileged organ, and increasing evidence suggests bidirectional communication between the immune system and the CNS.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFHorm Behav
June 2024
Environmental enrichment (EE) is a paradigm that offers the animal a plethora of stimuli, including physical, cognitive, sensory, and social enrichment. Exposure to EE can modulate both anxiety responses and plasma corticosterone. In this study, our objective was to explore how chronic unpredictable stress (CUS) impacts anxiety-related behaviors in male Swiss mice raised in EE conditions.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe kallikrein-kinin system is a versatile regulatory network implicated in various biological processes encompassing inflammation, nociception, blood pressure control, and central nervous system functions. Its physiological impact is mediated through G-protein-coupled transmembrane receptors, specifically the B1 and B2 receptors. Dopamine, a key catecholamine neurotransmitter widely distributed in the CNS, plays a crucial role in diverse physiological functions including motricity, reward, anxiety, fear, feeding, sleep, and arousal.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAnxiety, a state related to anticipatory fear, can be adaptive in the face of environmental threats or stressors. However, anxiety can also become persistent and manifest as anxiety- and stress-related disorders, such as generalized anxiety or post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). In rodents, systemic administration of glucocorticoids (GCs) or short-term restraint stress induces anxiety-like behaviors and dendritic branching within the basolateral complex of the amygdala (BLA) ten days later.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFDysfunctions in growth hormone (GH) secretion increase the prevalence of anxiety and other neuropsychiatric diseases. GH receptor (GHR) signaling in the amygdala has been associated with fear memory, a key feature of posttraumatic stress disorder. However, it is currently unknown which neuronal population is targeted by GH action to influence the development of neuropsychiatric diseases.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFOuabain (OUA) is a cardiotonic steroid that modulates Na+, K+ -ATPase activity. OUA has been identified as an endogenous substance that is present in human plasma, and it has been shown to be associated with the response to acute stress in both animals and humans. Chronic stress is a major aggravating factor in psychiatric disorders, including depression and anxiety.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFNeuropharmacology
March 2023
Studies investigated how stressful experiences modulate physiological and behavioral responses and the consequences of stress-induced corticosterone release in anxiety-like behavior. Adolescence is crucial to brain maturation, and several neurobiological changes in this period lead individuals to increased susceptibility or resilience to aversive situations. Despite the effects of stress in adults, information about adolescents' responses to acute stress is lacking.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground And Aim: Cortisol binds to mineralocorticoid receptor (MR) and glucocorticoid receptor (GR) found in the hippocampus. The balanced expression of these receptors is essential to neuronal survival as MR and GR activations have antiapoptotic and proapoptotic effects, respectively. Given the aging changes in dogs' dentate gyrus (DG) and the possible involvement of cortisol receptors in this process, this study aimed to evaluate the expression of MR and GR and neuronal degeneration in this hippocampal region of aged dogs.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: Knowledge on the neurobiological systems underlying psychiatric disorders has considerably evolved due to findings on basic research using animal models. Anxiety-like behaviors in rodents are widely explored in neuroethological apparatuses, such as the light-dark box (LDB) test through different protocols, which have been shown to influence the behavioral outcomes and probably the activation of the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis.
New Method: Adult male Wistar rats were submitted to LDB in different room illumination conditions (25/0, 65/0 and/or 330/0 lux), initial positioning in the LDB compartments and previous stressful experience in the Elevated Plus Maze (EPM) or restraint stress (RS).
Although increasing evidence confirms neuropsychiatric manifestations associated mainly with severe COVID-19 infection, long-term neuropsychiatric dysfunction (recently characterized as part of "long COVID-19" syndrome) has been frequently observed after mild infection. We show the spectrum of cerebral impact of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) infection, ranging from long-term alterations in mildly infected individuals (orbitofrontal cortical atrophy, neurocognitive impairment, excessive fatigue and anxiety symptoms) to severe acute damage confirmed in brain tissue samples extracted from the orbitofrontal region (via endonasal transethmoidal access) from individuals who died of COVID-19. In an independent cohort of 26 individuals who died of COVID-19, we used histopathological signs of brain damage as a guide for possible SARS-CoV-2 brain infection and found that among the 5 individuals who exhibited those signs, all of them had genetic material of the virus in the brain.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFNeuroscience
October 2022
Parkinson's Disease (PD) is a neurogenerative disorder characterized by the death of dopaminergic neurons in the Substantia Nigra pars compacta (SNpc), leading to motor, cognitive, learning, and respiratory dysfunctions. New evidence revealed that breathing impairment in PD mainly results from oxidative stress (OS) that initiates apoptotic signaling in respiratory neurons. Here, we investigated the role of OS inhibition using apocynin (non-specific NADPH oxidase inhibitor) in a 6-OHDA PD animal model in the neural control of breathing.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFPsychoneuroendocrinology
July 2022
Previous studies have suggested that the basolateral amygdala (BLA) and the ventral hippocampus (VH) are critical sites for predator-related fear memory. Predator exposure is an intense emotional experience and should increase plasmatic corticosterone likely to modulate the emotion-related memories. However, it is unclear whether the BLA and VH harbor plastic events underlying predator-related fear memory storage and how molecular and endocrine mechanisms interact to modulate memory to the predatory threat.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFTransient global ischemia is a leading cause of learning and memory dysfunction and induces a pattern of delayed neuronal death in the CA1 subfield of the hippocampus by down-regulating GluR2 mRNA AMPA receptors in this cerebral area. This study sought to investigate the neuroprotective effect of coumestrol against spatial memory impairment induced by global ischemia that leads to neural death by reducing the GluR2 receptors content in the hippocampal CA1 area. Our studies demonstrated that coumestrol administration prevented spatial memory deficits in mice.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFMol Neurobiol
October 2021
The stress response is multifactorial and enrolls circuitries to build a coordinated reaction, leading to behavioral, endocrine, and autonomic changes. These changes are mainly related to the hypothalamus-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis activation and the organism's integrity. However, when self-regulation is ineffective, stress becomes harmful and predisposes the organism to pathologies.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAlcohol use disorder is one of the most prevalent addictions, strongly influenced by environmental factors. Voluntary physical activity (VPA) has proven to be intrinsically reinforcing and we hypothesized that, as a non-drug reinforcer, VPA could mitigate ethanol-induced rewarding effects. The transcriptional factor cAMP response element binding protein (CREB), and deacetylases isozymes sirtuins 1 and 2 (SIRT-1 and SIRT-2) have a complex interplay and both play a role in the rewarding effects of ethanol.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFRecently, much attention has been drawn to the importance of the impact of infectious disease on human cognition. Several theories have been proposed, to explain the cognitive decline following an infection as well as to understand better the pathogenesis of human dementia, especially Alzheimer's disease. This article aims to review the state of the art regarding the knowledge about the impact of acute viral infections on human cognition, laying a foundation to explore the possible cognitive decline followed coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19).
View Article and Find Full Text PDFDepression and anxiety commonly occur in chronic pain states and the coexistence of these diseases worsens outcomes for both disorders and may reduce treatment adherence and response. Despite the advances in the knowledge of chronic pain mechanisms, pharmacological treatment is still unsatisfactory. Research based on exposure to environmental enrichment is currently under investigation and seems to offer a promising low-cost strategy with no side effects.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe persistence of anxiety and the deficit of fear memory extinction are both phenomena related to the symptoms of a trauma-related disorder, such as post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Recently we have shown that single acute restraint stress (2 h) in rats induces a late anxiety-related behavior (observed ten days after stress), whereas, in the present work, we found that the same stress impaired fear extinction in animals conditioned ten days after stress. Fourteen days of environmental enrichment (EE) prevented the deleterious effect of stress on fear memory extinction.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFKey Points: Parkinson's disease (PD) is associated with respiratory dysfunction. In the 6-OHDA rat model of PD this is seen as a reduction in respiratory frequency and minute ventilation during normoxia and hypercapnia stimulus. Respiratory dysfunction is caused by neuronal death of medullary respiratory nuclei in the 6-OHDA model of PD.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAn amendment to this paper has been published and can be accessed via a link at the top of the paper.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFZika virus (ZIKV) is a flavivirus linked to multiple birth defects including microcephaly, known as congenital ZIKV syndrome. The identification of host factors involved in ZIKV replication may guide efficacious therapeutic interventions. In genome-wide transcriptional studies, we found that ZIKV infection triggers aryl hydrocarbon receptor (AHR) activation.
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