Short-term sleep deprivation immediately after contextual conditioning inhibits BDNF signaling and disrupts memory consolidation in predator odor trauma mice model of PSTD.

Short-term sleep deprivation immediately after contextual conditioning inhibits BDNF signaling and disrupts memory consolidation in predator odor trauma mice model of PSTD.
Brain Res. 2020 Oct 15;:147155
Authors: Sharma R, Sahota P, Thakkar MM
Abstract
Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is a debilitating neuropsychiatric illness affecting >7 million people every year in the US. Recently, we have shown that the mouse model of predator odor trauma (POT) displayed contextual conditioning and core features of PTSD including sleep disturbances (hyperarousal) and retrieval of traumatic memories following exposure to objective reminders (re-experiencing). PTSD is a disorder of memory function. Since memory consolidation requires the expression of BDNF along with an activation of MAPK/pERK signaling pathway in limbic brain structures (hippocampus and amygdala) and sleep favors memory consolidation, we hypothesized that short-term sleep deprivation (SD, 3 hours), immediately after contextual conditioning will attenuate molecular correlates of memory consolidation, sleep disturbances, and memory consolidation. We performed two experiments in adult male C57BL/6J mice to test our hypothesis. Experiment 1 determined the effects of SD on contextual conditioning and changes in sleep wakefulness. Experiment 2 determined the effects of SD on contextual conditioning-induced changes in the expression of BDNF and pERK in hippocampus and amygdala. ...

Source: Brain Research - October 15, 2020 Category: Neurology Authors: Sharma R, Sahota P, Thakkar MM Tags: Brain Res Source Type: research