Optical imaging reveals reduced seizure spread and propagation velocities in aged rat brain in vitro

Old age is the most common time for patients to develop epileptic seizures, and due to their frequent unusual clinical presentation the diagnosis of epilepsy is often delayed in the elderly. It is as yet unknown if pronounced alterations in the plastic properties of aging nervous tissue contribute to these phenomena. We employed a non-lesional in vitro epilepsy model to study seizure susceptibility, spread pattern, and propagation velocities in combined hippocampal-entorhinal cortex slices of aged rats and controls using electrophysiological methods and imaging of intrinsic optical signals. In aged animals we saw a less extensive spread of seizure-like events into areas adjacent to the region of onset of activity and a decreased spread velocity in various anatomical regions. In addition, both the activity-dependent shrinkage of the extracellular space (ECS)-volume and the extracellular K(+) concentration were significantly reduced compared to controls. The results of this study are consistent with the clinical observation that epileptic seizures in the elderly have a reduced tendency to spread. In addition, our data suggest that in the absence of structural lesions seizure susceptibility in the aging brain is not increased.