Corley SR, Atkinson M, Cabrera S, Castillo A, Crawford D, Kitto M, Butt AE (2004) Cholinergic basal forebrain lesions disrupt acquisition of cued and uncued differential reinforcement of low rate responding. Neuroscience 2004 Abstracts 436.10. Society for Neuroscience, San Diego, CA.
Summary: The frontal cortex, medial septum/vertical diagonal band (MS/VDB), and hippocampus have been implicated in supporting differential reinforcement of low rate responding (DRL) behavior in rats. Because the frontal cortex and hippocampus receive cholinergic input from the basal forebrain, we hypothesized that 192 IgG-saporin (SAP) lesions of the basal forebrain would disrupt DRL acquisition in the current experiment. To distinguish between potential deficits in timing, as opposed to impairments in response inhibition, we trained rats in either the standard DRL task (which requires both timing of behavior and response inhibition) and on a cued version of the task (which does not require the ability to time behavior but does require response inhibition). Rats were first shaped to bar press before receiving either bilateral SAP lesions of the basal forebrain or sham lesions. Rats were returned to bar press training for 5 more days. Rats were then shifted to a DRL 20 s, LH 10 s (limited-hold 10 s) schedule of reinforcement. Half of the rats were provided with a cue light signaling the availability of reinforcement, whereas the other half underwent standard DRL 20 s LH 10 s testing without the visual cue. Rats with basal forebrain lesions showed a transient impairment in response inhibition in both the standard and the cued version of the DRL task. Both lesion groups made more responses at short inter-response-intervals than controls across the first 15 test days, although this impairment attenuated by the 20th test day. These data suggest that the cholinergic basal forebrain is involved in learning to withhold responding during acquisition in DRL.
Related Products: 192-IgG-SAP (Cat. #IT-01)