Stereological quantification of cellular populations in the prefrontal cortex of rats submitted to neonatal anoxia

• Grant number: 11/18295-1
• Support Opportunities: Regular Research Grants
• Start date: March 01, 2012
• End date: February 28, 2014
• Field of knowledge: Health Sciences - Dentistry
• Principal Investigator: Roelf Justino Cruz-Rizzolo
• Grantee: Roelf Justino Cruz-Rizzolo
• Host Institution: Faculdade de Odontologia (FOA). Universidade Estadual Paulista (UNESP). Campus de Araçatuba. Araçatuba , SP, Brazil
• City of the host institution: Araçatuba
• Associated researchers: Edilson Ervolino ; Maria Inês Nogueira ; Samira Schultz Mansur ; Silvia Honda Takada

Abstract

Neonatal hypoxia (NH) or anoxia (NA) are considered a serious public health concern. In HN there is a decrease in the oxygen content of the organic tissues and, in extremis, the concentration of oxygen in the fetal blood can reach levels close to zero (NA). Epidemiological studies indicate that oxygen deprivation during delivery may represent risk factors for the late onset of some mental disorders, fundamentally schizophrenia, condition where the prefrontal cortex plays a fundamental role. In view of this correlation between these neuropsychiatric symptoms and the anoxic neonatal insult,it remains to be seen if some of the structural changes found mainly in the prefrontal cortex of patients with these conditions may be reproduced in experimental models of NA. Thus, in the present study, using a model of rat NA we will quantify some cellular populations in the newborn and young rat prefrontal cortex, using unbiased stereological analysis. This quantification shall include the quantification of the global population showed by NeuN immunohistochemistry; the neuronal populations of neurons that express calcium binding proteins, such as parvalbumin, calbindin and calretinin, which represent more than 90% of all the GABAergic neurons of the cerebral cortex, allowing the analyses of the possible changes in the circuits of this neurotransmitter; the populations of neurons that express reelin, a glycoprotein synthesized by a subgroup of GABAergic neurons, that plays an important role during neuronal migration and sinapotogenesis, and whose quantitative change is associated with cognitive deficits and in experimental models of prenatal hypoxia; the astrocytic population in the mPfC using GFAP (glial fibrillary acid protein) immunohistochemistry. (AU)