Permanent bilateral common carotid arterial ligation impairs visual but not auditory conditioned avoidance behavior...

The effect of permanent bilateral common carotid arteries ligation (BCCAL) on visual function was investigated using conditioned avoidance task in Wistar rats. Behavioral experiments began 1 month after ligation. When light was used as a conditioned stimulus, the number of avoidance failures of BCCAL rats was higher than that of sham-operated control animals. However, the performance of the same avoidance task using a buzzer instead of light stimulus was not impaired by BCCAL. BCCAL impaired performance in the Morris water maze learning task and the rhythm of diurnal and nocturnal spontaneous motor activities. These results indicate that BCCAL treatment induces dysfunction of the visual system in rats, and consequently results in apparent deficits in conditioned avoidance behavior. BCCAL-induced deficits in performance in the water maze and rhythm of the motor activities are at least partially attributable to optical dysfunction.