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Postnatal development of choline acetyltransferase activity in the rat laterodorsal tegmental nucleus
Y Ninomiya1, Y Koyama, Y Kayama
1Department of Physiology, School of Medicine, Fukushima Medical University, 1 Hikari-ga-oka, Fukushima 960-1295, Japan. n-alphy@fmu.ac.jp
Abstract:
Cholinergic neurons in the laterodorsal tegmental nucleus (LDT) have important roles in the regulation of sleep or waking in adult animals. In neonatal animals, sleep is largely occupied by paradoxical sleep. To investigate the relation between the cholinergic neurons in the LDT and the development of neonatal sleep, we dissected the LDT of rat by micropunch method at postnatal day 1--45 and measured the activity of choline acetyltransferase (ChAT). Either specific or total activity of ChAT was weak in the first week, increased strikingly in the second week and then moderately thereafter. The time course of the increase in ChAT activity correlates well to that of the decrease in the amount of paradoxical sleep or body twitches after birth.