3 results match your criteria: "University of Cagliari and Institute of Neuroscience[Affiliation]"

Nicotine-conditioned single-trial place preference: selective role of nucleus accumbens shell dopamine D1 receptors in acquisition.

Psychopharmacology (Berl)

March 2006

Department of Toxicology, Centre of Excellence for Studies on the Neurobiology of Addiction, University of Cagliari and Institute of Neuroscience, Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche, Cagliari, Italy.

Rationale: Experimental evidence indicates that the mesolimbic dopamine (DA) pathway innervating the ventral striatum is critically involved in the motivational effects of drug abuse. However, the role of DA transmission of the two main subdivisions of the nucleus accumbens (NAc), the shell and the core, in the motivational properties of nicotine is unknown.

Objectives: The aim of this study was to investigate the role of DA D1 and D2 receptors of the rat NAc shell and core in the motivational effects of nicotine using a conditioned place preference (CPP) paradigm.

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Differential role of dopamine in drug- and lithium-conditioned saccharin avoidance.

Physiol Behav

May 2005

Department of Toxicology, Centre of Excellence for Studies on the Neurobiology of Addiction, University of Cagliari and Institute of Neuroscience, Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche, 09124 Cagliari, Italy.

Rats learn to avoid palatable saccharin solutions that predict the systemic administration of reinforcing drugs as well as malaise-inducing lithium chloride (conditioned saccharin avoidance, CSA). In the present study the involvement of dopamine (DA) transmission in the acquisition of morphine, nicotine and lithium-conditioned CSA was investigated in a two-bottle choice paradigm. Nicotine tartrate (0.

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The role of dopamine (DA) in associative learning was studied in a conditioned taste aversion (CTA) paradigm with sucrose as the conditioned stimulus (CS) and intraperitoneal lithium chloride as the unconditioned stimulus (US). Drinking on trial of a 15% sucrose solution followed 1 h later by lithium chloride (20 or 40 mg/kg i.p.

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