Source Paper
Corticolimbic Dopamine Neurotransmission Is Temporally Dissociated from the Cognitive and Locomotor Effects of Phencyclidine
Barbara Adams, Bita Moghaddam
Journal of Neuroscience • 1998
Discrete Trial Delayed Alternation Task
Objective: Assessment of working memory impairment in rodents following PCP injection to model frontal lobe deficits, specifically measuring performance on a discrete trial delayed alternation task
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Equipment3
Materials1
Not specified • Not specified • Not specified • Not specified
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Protocol Steps
PCP Administration
Administer PCP injection to rodent subjects
Note: Injection timing serves as time zero for subsequent behavioral and neurochemical measurements
View evidence from paper
“impaired performance in a discrete trial delayed alternation task, a rodent working memory task, was only evident up to 60 min after PCP injection”
Discrete Trial Delayed Alternation Task Testing at 60 minutes
Test rodent performance on discrete trial delayed alternation task at 60 minutes post-PCP injection
Note: Impaired performance is evident at this timepoint
View evidence from paper
“impaired performance in a discrete trial delayed alternation task, a rodent working memory task, was only evident up to 60 min after PCP injection”
Discrete Trial Delayed Alternation Task Testing at 80 minutes
Test rodent performance on discrete trial delayed alternation task at 80 minutes post-PCP injection
Note: Animals tested at this timepoint do not exhibit impaired performance despite elevated cortical dopamine
View evidence from paper
“animals tested 80 min after injection, when cortical dopamine release was elevated at 300% of baseline, did not exhibit impaired performance”
Locomotor Activity Monitoring
Monitor and measure locomotor activity throughout the experimental period
Note: Locomotor activity returns to baseline within 2 hours despite elevated dopamine
View evidence from paper
“locomotor activity returned to baseline in <2 hr after injection”
Microdialysis Measurement
Measure dopamine and glutamate efflux in prefrontal cortex and nucleus accumbens
Note: Dopamine remains elevated well above baseline at 2.5 hours when experiment was terminated
View evidence from paper
“The increase in dopamine in both regions remained elevated well above baseline 2.5 hr after the injection, at which time the experiment was terminated”