Abstract
Social isolation and energy metabolism in rat hippocampus. Social isolation could be understood as a kind of sensorial deprivation. It is well known that enriched or complex stimular environments affect CNS at both anatomical and physiological levels. In our study, two groups of rats were used: one was comprised of isolated animals from the end of the lactation period during 30 days and a control group of animals housed in groups of three during the same period. Brain hippocampal oxidative metabolism was measured using cytochrome oxidase histochemistry (CO) in CA1, CA3 and dentate gyrus regions. The results show a significant increase of CO activity in all of the regions studied in the isolated group, with differences among the studied hippocampal regions in both groups. In this paper, the possible role of brain arousal caused by stress and the sensitivity of CO histochemistry to detect these changes are discussed.
