Critical neuropsychobiological analysis of panic attack- and anticipatory anxiety-like behaviors in rodents confronted with snakes in polygonal arenas and complex labyrinths: a comparison to the elevated plus- and T-maze behavioral tests.

Objective:: To compare prey and snake paradigms performed in complex environments to the elevated plus-maze (EPM) and T-maze (ETM) tests for the study of panic attack- and anticipatory anxiety-like behaviors in rodents.

Methods:: PubMed was reviewed in search of articles focusing on the plus maze test, EPM, and ETM, as well as on defensive behaviors displayed by threatened rodents. In addition, the authors' research with polygonal arenas and complex labyrinth (designed by the first author for confrontation between snakes and small rodents) was examined.

Curcumin suppresses inflammatory cytokines and heat shock protein 70 release and improves metabolic parameters during experimental sepsis.

Context: Curcumin has been reported to have anti-inflammatory, antioxidant and hypoglycaemic properties, besides reducing mortality in sepsis.

Objective: This study evaluates the biological activities of a curcumin dispersion formulated by spray-drying in experimental sepsis.

Materials And Methods: Male Wistar rats were subjected to sepsis by caecal ligation and puncture (CLP), controls were sham operated.

Neuroethological validation of an experimental apparatus to evaluate oriented and non-oriented escape behaviours: Comparison between the polygonal arena with a burrow and the circular enclosure of an open-field test.

Inhibition of GABAergic neural inputs to dorsal columns of the periaqueductal grey matter (dPAG), posterior (PH) and dorsomedial (DMH) hypothalamic nuclei elicits distinct types of escape behavioural reactions. To differentiate between the variety and intensity of panic-related behaviours, the pattern of defensive behaviours evoked by blockade of GABAA receptors in the DMH, PH and dPAG were compared in a circular open-field test and in a recently designed polygonal arena. In the circular open-field, the defensive behaviours induced by microinjection of bicuculline into DMH and PH were characterised by defensive alertness behaviour and vertical jumps preceded by rearing exploratory behaviour.

Endogenous opioid peptide-mediated neurotransmission in central and pericentral nuclei of the inferior colliculus recruits μ1-opioid receptor to modulate post-ictal antinociception.

Background: The aim of the present work was to investigate the involvement of the μ1-endogenous opioid peptide receptor-mediated system in post-ictal antinociception.

Methods: Antinociceptive responses were determined by the tail-flick test after pre-treatment with the selective μ1-opioid receptor antagonist naloxonazine, peripherally or centrally administered at different doses.

Results: Peripheral subchronic (24 h) pre-treatment with naloxonazine antagonised the antinociception elicited by tonic-clonic seizures.

Paradoxical effect of noradrenaline-mediated neurotransmission in the antinociceptive phenomenon that accompanies tonic-clonic seizures: role of locus coeruleus neurons and α(2)- and β-noradrenergic receptors.

The postictal state is generally followed by antinociception. It is known that connections between the dorsal raphe nucleus, the periaqueductal gray matter, and the locus coeruleus, an important noradrenergic brainstem nucleus, are involved in the descending control of ascending nociceptive pathways. The aim of the present study was to determine whether noradrenergic mechanisms in the locus coeruleus are involved in postictal antinociception.