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Updated: Jun 4, 2026
Permanent Cerebral Vessel Occlusion via Double Ligature and Transection
Published on: July 21, 2013
Amount but not pattern of protective sensory stimulation alters recovery after permanent middle cerebral artery
Melissa F Davis1, Christopher C Lay, Cynthia H Chen-Bee
1University of California-Irvine, 2205 McGaugh Hall, Ring Road, Department of Neurobiology & Behavior, UCI, Irvine CA 92697, USA.
Background And Purpose:
Using a rodent model of ischemia (permanent middle cerebral artery occlusion), our laboratory previously demonstrated that 4.27 minutes of patterned single-whisker stimulation delivered over 120 minutes can fully protect from impending damage when initiated within 2 hours of permanent middle cerebral artery occlusion ("early"). When initiated 3 hours postpermanent middle cerebral artery occlusion ("late"), stimulation resulted in irreversible damage. Here we investigate the effect of altering pattern, distribution, or amount of stimulation in this model.
Methods:
We assessed the cortex using functional imaging and histological analysis with altered stimulation treatment protocols. In 2 groups of animals we administered the same number of whisker deflections but in a random rather than patterned fashion distributed either over 120 minutes or condensed into 10 minutes postpermanent middle cerebral artery occlusion. We also tested increased (full-whisker array versus single-whisker) stimulation.
Results:
Early random whisker stimulation (condensed or dispersed) resulted in protection equivalent to early patterned stimulation. Early full-whisker array patterned stimulation also resulted in complete protection but promoted faster recovery. Late full-whisker array patterned stimulation, however, resulted in loss of evoked function and infarct volumes larger than those sustained by single-whisker counterparts.
Conclusions:
When induced early on after ischemic insult, stimulus-evoked cortical activity, irrespective of the parameters of peripheral stimulation that induced it, seems to be the important variable for neuroprotection.
