Brain response to alchol after a predator odor stressor (2023)
Undergraduate: Elisabeth Pitrolo
Faculty Advisor: Joyce Besheer
Department: Psychology & Neuroscience
Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is highly comorbid with alcohol use disorder (AUD). Furthermore, data indicate the rate of comorbidity may be related to sex, as females have a higher rate of comorbid PTSD/AUD than males. Thus, the current study focuses on the neuronal response to alcohol following a stressor in males and females in two brain regions in relation to AUD/PTSD – these are the anterior insular cortex (aIC) and prelimbic cortex (PrL). The current study exposes male and female rats to 2,5-dihydro-2,4,5-trimethylthiazoline (TMT). TMT is a synthetically-made component of fox feces that is a stressor that produces stress-reactive behaviors in rodents and has been used to model some PTSD symptoms. Rats in the current study were exposed to TMT or water for controls and then injected with alcohol or water two weeks later. Rats were sacrificed 90 minutes following alcohol injection. Brain slices were then collected for c-Fos immunohistochemistry. TMT exposure results indicated that TMT produced stress-reactive behaviors in both male and female rats. Results of c-Fos analyses indicate that neuronal activation in the aIC is not altered following TMT exposure and alcohol injection. In the PrL in males, alcohol increased neuronal activation in controls and TMT significantly increased neuronal activation in general. In females, alcohol significantly decreased neuronal activation in controls and there was no change in neuronal activation in TMT-exposed rats. TMT also significantly decreased neuronal activation in females. The difference in patterns between males and females seen in the current study indicates possible sex differences.
Link to Poster