Difference between heartwood and sapwood
Forest Products Laboratory (U.S.)
1919
Search results
28 records were found.
Cardiovascular diseases are traditionally related to well known risk factors like dyslipidemia, smoking, diabetes and hypertension. More recently, stress, anxiety and depression have been proposed as risk factors for cardiovascular diseases including heart failure, ischemic disease, hypertension and arrhythmias. Interestingly, this association has been established largely on the basis of epidemiological data, due to insufficient knowledge on the underlying pathophysiologic mechanisms. This review will revisit evidence on the interaction between the cardiovascular and nervous systems, highlighting the perspective on how the central nervous system is involved in the pathogenesis of cardiovascular diseases. Such knowledge is likely to be of relevance for the development of better strategies to treat patients in a holistic perspective.
Imbalances in the corticosteroid milieu have been implicated in several neuropsychiatric disorders, including depression and schizo-phrenia.
Prefrontal cortex (PFC) dysfunction is also a hallmark of these conditions, causing impairments in executive functions such as
behavioral flexibility and working memory. Recent studies have suggested that the PFC might be influenced by corticosteroids released
during stress. To test this possibility, we assessed spatial working memory and behavioral flexibility in rats submitted to chronic
adrenalectomy or treatment with corticosterone (25 mg/kg) or the synthetic glucocorticoid dexamethasone (300 μg/kg); the behavioral
analysis was complemented by stereological evaluation of the PFC (prelimbic, infralimbic, and anterior cingulate regions), the adjacent
retrosplenial and motor cortices, and the hip...
Introduction: Brain regions implicated in sexual behavior begin to differentiate in the last trimester of gestation. Antenatal therapy with corticosteroids is often used in clinical practice during this period to accelerate lung maturation in pre-term risk pregnancies. Clinical and animal studies highlighted major behavioral impairments induced later in life by these treatments, especially when synthetic corticosteroids are used.
Aim: To evaluate the implications of acute prenatal treatment with natural versus synthetic corticosteroids on adult male rat sexual behavior and its neurochemical correlates.
Methods: Twelve pregnant Wistar rats were injected with dexamethasone (DEX-1mg/kg), corticosterone (CORT-25mg/kg) or saline on late gestation (pregnancy days 18 and 19). Following this brief exposure to corticosteroids, we assessed the ...
Cognitive neuroscience research has been recently advanced as central [o r a scientific foundation of psychotherapeutic treatment In fact, understanding how the maintenance, survival or neurological change is mediated psychological pro cesses, is fundamental for advancing our know ledge about the mechanisms of psychotherapy treatment. This study is an attempt to bring psychotherapy closer to neurocognitive research in order to foster understanding on the neurobiological effects 'if therapeutic equivalent tasks in reverting the effects (if chronic stress. More specifically, this study aims: (1) To compare spatial working memory and behavioural flexibility performances in groups (if adult rats submitted to chronic unpredictable stress and age-matched controls: and (2) To test the modulatory effects of a cognitive treatment-equivalent tas...
Obsessive–compulsive disorder (OCD) is achronic psychiatric disorder characterized by recurrent intrusive thoughts and/or repetitive compulsory behaviors. This psychiatric disorder is known to be stress responsive, as symptoms increase during periods of stress but also because stressful events may precede the onset of OCD. However, only a few and inconsistent reports have been published about the stress perception and the stress-response in these patients. Herein, we have characterized the correlations of OCD symptoms with basal serum cortisol levels and scores in a stress perceived questionnaire (PSS-10). The present data reveals that cortisol levels and the stress scores in the PSS-10 were significantly higher in OCD patients that in controls. Moreover, stress levels self-reported by patients using the PSS-10 correlated positively wi...
Chronic stress elicits remarkable alterations to the structure and function of several areas of the central nervous system. Nociception is
known to be affected by chronic stress and age, although the observations are contradictory. Herein we report that both young and old rats
submitted to a chronic unpredictable stress paradigm have reduced nociception in the tail-flick nociceptive test. Moreover, stressed animals
show an increase in nociceptive threshold after three successive exposures to noxious stimulation (within a 2 min interval). While the
sustained stress-induced analgesia is usually attributed to the resulting hypercorticalism, the immediate exacerbation of tolerance to pain
displayed by stressed animals is most likely mediated through other mechanisms due to the very rapid antinociceptive effect observed.
Several variables, including age, are known to influence anxiety. Previous exposure to the elevated-plus maze (EPM) is known to modify
emotional behaviour as retesting in the EPM at a standard age of 3 months increases open-arm avoidance and attenuates the effects of anxiolytic
drugs. This study analysed whether similar results are obtained when older animals are subjected to these experimental paradigms. Overall,
increasing age was associated with more signs of anxiety. Additionally, we observed a paradoxical behaviour pattern in aged-subjects that
were re-exposed to the EPM, with mid-aged and old rats failing to display open arm avoidance (OAA) in the second trial; this qualitative shift
in emotional behaviour was not associated with decreased locomotion. An examination of how age influences responsiveness to anxiolytic
drugs, with o...
This paper presents a novel rodent decision-making task that explores uncertainty, independently of expectation and predictability. Using a 5-hole operating box, adult male Wistar rats were given choices between a small certain (safe) food reward and a large uncertain (risk) food reward. We found that animals strongly preferred the safe option when it had a fixed position or was cued with a light in a random placement scheme, but had no preference for safe or risk options when the latter were associated with light. Importantly, when the reward was manipulated animals could perceive alterations in the outcome value and biased their choice pattern to the most profitable option. In addition, we found that the D2/D3 agonist quinpirole biased all decisions toward risk in this paradigm. Finally, a c-fos analysis revealed that several brain a...
