Synaptic plasticity in rat hippocampus associated with learning

Rats subjected to a one-way active avoidance task consisting of 3 daily training sessions, showed obvious shape changes in dendritic spines of the hippocampal supragranular molecular layer. Performance, expressed as the number of avoidances per 10 trials, significantly improved in the second and third session (P < 0.001). In trained animals, at the end of the third session, the amount of perforated concave synapses significantly increased as compared to untrained controls (P < 0.05). When compared with a group of sham-shocked rats, the increase was less pronounced. The length of the postsynaptic density in both, perforated and non-perforated synapses, significantly increased in comparison with untrained control and sham-shocked animals (perforated: P < 0.005; non-perforated: P < 0.05). The results are indicative for the existence of synaptic remodeling and turnover in rats subjected to one-way active avoidance training.