Involvement of nucleus accumbens in L-arginine-induced conditioned place preference in rats

Abstract

In the present study, the effects of intraperitoneal, intra-accumbal and intra-ventral tegmental area administration of L-arginine and N(G)-nitro-L-arginine methyl-ester (L-NAME) on conditioned place preference behavior were studied. Intraperitoneal (i.p.; 0.5, 1 and 5 mg/kg) and intra-accumbal (intra-NAc; 0.3, 1 and 3 microg/rat), but not intra-ventral tegmental area (intra-VTA; 0.3, 1 and 3 microg/rat) administrations of L-arginine produced a significant place conditioning. Similar injections of L-NAME did not produce any response. However, intraperitoneal pretreatment of the animals with L-NAME (5, 10 and 20 mg/kg), 30 min before L-arginine administration, significantly abolished the acquisition of place conditioning induced by either intraperitoneal or intra-accumbal injection of L-arginine. Moreover, injection of L-NAME (5, 10 and 20 mg/kg) on the test day did not alter the L-arginine response. The results may indicate that L-arginine induces conditioned place preference via an increase in nitric oxide (NO) in the nucleus accumbens.

Rewarding properties of sildenafil citrate in mice: role of the nitric oxide-cyclic GMP pathway

“…In addition, it was shown that constitutive NO levels play a role in the modulation of dopamine outflow in the nigrostriatal movement and the mesolimbic and mesocortical reward and motivation circuitries (Fricchione and Stefano 2005). The intraperitoneal and intra-accumbal administrations of the NOS substrate L-arginine are shown to produce a significant place conditioning in rats (Sahraei et al 2004). Moreover, pretreatment with L-NAME suppresses the maintenance of intravenous cocaine self-administration and the absolute reward magnitude of cocaine in rats (Pulvirenti et al 1996).…”

Involvement of the insular nitric oxide signaling pathway in the expression of morphine-induced conditioned place preference in rats

“…NO is intimately implicated in addiction memory. Administration of L-arginine intraperitoneally or into the nucleus accumbens induces significant CPP in rats [4,5]. Coadministration of L-arginine enhances nicotine-CPP [5] and morphine-CPP [6].…”

Motivationally neutral stimulation of the nucleus basalis induces specific behavioral memory

“…Second, the NB/ACh system could be "downstream" of motivational systems but be engaged by them (both positive and negative in valence) to promote the storage of the information currently being processed, perhaps throughout the cortex and at any other cholinergic targets. To investigate these two alternatives, we used a place-preference test in an arena divided into four quadrants (Bardo, Rowlett, & Harris, 1995;Hasenohrl, Oitzl, & Huston, 1989;see also Panos, Rademacher, Renner, & Steinpreis, 1999;Sahraei, Pirzadeh-Jahromi, Noorbakhshnia, Asgari, Haeri-Rohani, Khoshbaten, Poorheidari, Sepehri, Ghoshooni, & Zarrindast, 2004). We first induced specific auditory memory in rats and later confined them to a quadrant of an arena while they received the same NBstm that had been used to induce memory.…”