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Effects of anticonvulsants drugs
in rats submmited to the Conditioned Emotional Response paradigm Liana Lins Melo, M. H Sampaio, V. H. R. Marussi and Elenice A de Moraes Ferrari Universidade São Francisco and Universidade Estadual de Campinas, Brasil When exposed to a tone previously paired with a shock rats freeze and supress ongoing operant behavior. This response is usually referred as a measurement of Conditioned Emotional Response (CER) and provides an interesting tool for the analysis of learning and memory processes and drugs effects. The aim of this study was to evaluate the effects of chronic or acute administration of Lamotrigine, a novel anticonvulsant drug, and Phenytoin, a classical anticonvulsant drug, on learning and memory in a CER paradigm in rats. CER was analysed as a suppression ratio [SR= time to complete 10 licks before the tone/(time to complete ten licks during the tone + time to complete 10 licks before the tone)]. The SR after the chronic or acute treatment with LTG (0,26 + 0,07 and 0,29 + 0,09 respectively), were higher than the control group (0,05 + 0,02; p<0,05). Phenytoin chronically treated animals did not differ significantly from the controls (0,069 ± 0,03 and 0,108 ± 0,05 respectively): both showed lower ratios indicative of learning and memory. The results suggested that LTG can induces deficits of memory indicated by higher suppression ratios values. Keywords: learning, Lamotrigine, Phenytoin, conditioning, anticonvulsants |
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