Effect of acute alarm odor exposure and biological sex on generalized avoidance and glutamatergic signaling in the hippocampus of Wistar rats.

We report that female Wistar rats exposed to alarm odor exhibit context discrimination impairments relative to TMT-exposed male rats, suggesting the intriguing possibility that females are at greater risk in developing generalized fear memories. Mechanistically, alarm odor exposure rapidly modulated signaling cascades consistent with activation of the CREB shut-off cascade in the male, but not the female hippocampus. Moreover, TMT exposure dampened glutamate uptake and affected expression of the glutamate transporter, GLT-1 in the hippocampus. Taken together, these results provide evidence for rapid sex-dependent modulation of CREB signaling in the hippocampus by alarm odor exposure which may contribute to the development of generalized fear. PMID: 29916754 [PubMed - as supplied by publisher]
Source: Stress - Category: Research Tags: Stress Source Type: research