Increased length of terminal dendritic segments in old adult rats' somatosensory cortex: An environmentally induced response

Connor, James R.; Wang, Edward C.; Diamond, Marian C.

doi:10.1016/0014-4886(82)90064-4

Cited by 38 publications

(18 citation statements)

References 5 publications

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“…In rats, behavioral challenges through an enriched environment have been shown to affect many morphological and physiological parameters including neurogenesis [39], [40], [41], [42], [43]. Interestingly, for aged rats that were kept in enriched conditions for their entire life beneficial effects on cortical forepaw neurons have been reported [44].…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Differential Effects of Aging on Fore– and Hindpaw Maps of Rat Somatosensory Cortex

et al. 2008

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Getting older is associated with a decline of cognitive and sensorimotor abilities, but it remains elusive whether age-related changes are due to accumulating degenerational processes, rendering them largely irreversible, or whether they reflect plastic, adaptational and presumably compensatory changes. Using aged rats as a model we studied how aging affects neural processing in somatosensory cortex. By multi-unit recordings in the fore- and hindpaw cortical maps we compared the effects of aging on receptive field size and response latencies. While in aged animals response latencies of neurons of both cortical representations were lengthened by approximately the same amount, only RFs of hindpaw neurons showed severe expansion with only little changes of forepaw RFs. To obtain insight into parallel changes of walking behavior, we recorded footprints in young and old animals which revealed a general age-related impairment of walking. In addition we found evidence for a limb-specific deterioration of the hindlimbs that was not observed in the forelimbs. Our results show that age-related changes of somatosensory cortical neurons display a complex pattern of regional specificity and parameter-dependence indicating that aging acts rather selectively on cortical processing of sensory information. The fact that RFs of the fore- and hindpaws do not co-vary in aged animals argues against degenerational processes on a global scale. We therefore conclude that age-related alterations are composed of plastic-adaptive alterations in response to modified use and degenerational changes developing with age. As a consequence, age-related changes need not be irreversible but can be subject to amelioration through training and stimulation.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Differential Effects of Aging on Fore– and Hindpaw Maps of Rat Somatosensory Cortex

et al. 2008

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“…Placing rats in a complex environment (enriched environment) results in profound changes across the cortex including increases in cortical weight and thickness (Bennett et al, 1969; Diamond et al, 1964), dendritic branching and complexity, dendritic spine density, synapse number and size, glial numbers and complexity, and vascular arborization (Altman and Das, 1964; Connor et al, 1982; Greenough et al, 1985; Johansson and Belichenko, 2002; Kolb and Gibb, 2015; Leggio et al, 2005). The enriched-environment housing also increases the contact between astrocytes and synaptic elements (Diamond et al, 1966; Jones and Greenough, 1996; Sirevaag and Greenough, 1991) and enhances synaptic strength and plasticity (Artola et al, 2006; Duffy et al, 2001; Foster and Dumas, 2001; Green and Greenough, 1986).…”

Section: Putative Therapies For Enhancing Brain Self-repair and Strokmentioning

confidence: 99%

Enhancing endogenous capacity to repair a stroke-damaged brain: An evolving field for stroke research

Zhao

Willing

2018

Progress in Neurobiology

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Stroke represents a severe medical condition that causes stroke survivors to suffer from long-term and even lifelong disability. Over the past several decades, a vast majority of stroke research targets neuroprotection in the acute phase, while little work has been done to enhance stroke recovery at the later stage. Through reviewing current understanding of brain plasticity, stroke pathology, and emerging preclinical and clinical restorative approaches, this review aims to provide new insights to advance the research field for stroke recovery. Lifelong brain plasticity offers the long-lasting possibility to repair a stroke-damaged brain. Stroke impairs the structural and functional integrity of entire brain networks; the restorative approaches containing multi-components have great potential to maximize stroke recovery by rebuilding and normalizing the stroke-disrupted entire brain networks and brain functioning. The restorative window for stroke recovery is much longer than previously thought. The optimal time for brain repair appears to be at later stage of stroke rather than the earlier stage. It is expected that these new insights will advance our understanding of stroke recovery and assist in developing the next generation of restorative approaches for enhancing brain repair after stroke.

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“…The factors contributing to these gross morphological changes include increased neuronal density and size, increased dendritic branching and length, increased dendritic spine density, and increased turnover in pyramidal and stellate cells (Holloway, 1966; Diamond et al, 1967; Volkmar and Greenough, 1972; Globus et al, 1973; Greenough and Volkmar, 1973; Greenough et al, 1973; Uylings et al, 1978; Connor et al, 1982; Turner and Greenough, 1985; Kempermann et al, 1997; Leggio et al, 2005; Jung and Herms, 2012). Unsurprisingly, the changes in dendritic morphology are accompanied by synaptic alterations, with EE resulting in increased numbers of synapses and synaptic contacts (Jones et al, 1997; Briones et al, 2004; Landers et al, 2011), which could enhance cortical synaptic transmission and hence, alter cortical excitation/inhibition balances.…”

Section: Mechanisms Underlying Ee-induced Changes In Neuronal Functionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Environmental enrichment and the sensory brain: the role of enrichment in remediating brain injury

Alwis

Rajan

2014

Front. Syst. Neurosci.

105

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The brain's life-long capacity for experience-dependent plasticity allows adaptation to new environments or to changes in the environment, and to changes in internal brain states such as occurs in brain damage. Since the initial discovery by Hebb (1947) that environmental enrichment (EE) was able to confer improvements in cognitive behavior, EE has been investigated as a powerful form of experience-dependent plasticity. Animal studies have shown that exposure to EE results in a number of molecular and morphological alterations, which are thought to underpin changes in neuronal function and ultimately, behavior. These consequences of EE make it ideally suited for investigation into its use as a potential therapy after neurological disorders, such as traumatic brain injury (TBI). In this review, we aim to first briefly discuss the effects of EE on behavior and neuronal function, followed by a review of the underlying molecular and structural changes that account for EE-dependent plasticity in the normal (uninjured) adult brain. We then extend this review to specifically address the role of EE in the treatment of experimental TBI, where we will discuss the demonstrated sensorimotor and cognitive benefits associated with exposure to EE, and their possible mechanisms. Finally, we will explore the use of EE-based rehabilitation in the treatment of human TBI patients, highlighting the remaining questions regarding the effects of EE.

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Increased length of terminal dendritic segments in old adult rats' somatosensory cortex: An environmentally induced response

Cited by 38 publications

References 5 publications

Differential Effects of Aging on Fore– and Hindpaw Maps of Rat Somatosensory Cortex

Differential Effects of Aging on Fore– and Hindpaw Maps of Rat Somatosensory Cortex

Enhancing endogenous capacity to repair a stroke-damaged brain: An evolving field for stroke research

Environmental enrichment and the sensory brain: the role of enrichment in remediating brain injury

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