Can early protein malnutrition facilitate cocaine relapse?

Congreso; XXVIII Congreso de la Sociedad Argentina de Investigación en Neurociencias. Bases Neuronales de la Conducta: Neuroetología y Neurobiología de la Memoria en el Cono Sur; 2013

Sociedad Argentina de Investigación en Neurociencias

Previously we demonstrated that perinatal protein deprivation increases therewarding effects of cocaine, and facilitates the development of behavioralsensitization to this drug. This study evaluated if the increased reactivity evidencedin deprived (D) versus control (C) rats is also evident during the reinstatement ofconditioned place preference (CPP), a useful animal model to study relapse. Inorder to assess the reinstatement of a cocaine-induced CPP, different groups of CandD- rats were submitted to 4 conditioning sessions with cocaine (10 mg/kg, i.p.).In order to induce extinction, following the CPP test, animals were paired withsaline for 3 or 4 days. Three days of extinction training did not induce CPPextinction. After 4 days of training, both groups of rats showed a significantdecrease in the time spent in the drug-paired compartment. The day after theextinction test, rats received a priming injection of cocaine (2.5 or 5 mg/kg) toanalyze if cocaine-induced CPP could be reinstated. Only D-rats showedreinstatement of preference for the drug-paired context after a priming injectionwith the lowest dose of cocaine used (2.5 mg/kg). Furthermore, CPP could bereinstated with 5 mg/kg of cocaine in both C- and D- groups. These preliminaryresults extend previous reports from our lab that clearly demonstrate that earlynutritional insult during early life brings about alterations in the rewarding neuralcircuits that modify the reactivity to drugs of abuse.