Disruptive Effect of Midazolam on Fear Memory Reconsolidation: Decisive Influence of Reactivation Time Span and Memory Age

SILVIA G. BUSTOS, HÉCTOR MALDONADO AND VÍCTOR A. MOLINA.

Nature Publishing Group

Lugar: New York; Año: 2009 vol. 34 p. 446 - 446

font size="1" face="AdvGillSan-L"> Benzodiazepine (BDZ) administered shortly after retrieval disrupts the reconsolidation of fear memory. In this research, we explored the way in which different factors that limit the emergence of such process may affect BDZ?s disruptive effect on fear memory reconsolidation. Animals were conditioned in a contextual fear paradigm; the consolidated memory was reactivated by exposure to the associated context for different periods of time that were followed by midazolam (MDZ) administration. We also studied MDZ amnesic effect after reactivating fear memories of several ages. We finally analyzed the effectiveness of different MDZ doses in preventing the reconsolidation of different age fear memories. The memory trace was disrupted following MDZ when the reactivation session lasted 3?5 min but it was not after a br