Hypothermia-induced retrograde amnesia in mature and aged rats

Mature (10-month-old) and aged (25-month-old) rats were trained on a passive avoidance task. Following training, rats in each age group were exposed to a hypothermia treatment, restraint alone, or no treatment. The hypothermia treatment involved immersing the mature rats in 4 degrees C water for 12 min and immersing the aged rats in 1 degrees C water for 12 min. This treatment reduced the body temperature of both age groups to an equivalent temperature (22 degrees C). Following immersion, the body temperature of the aged rats continued to decline to a lower level and recovered at a slower rate than the mature rat's temperatures. When all rats were tested 24 hr after training for retention of the avoidance task, mature rats performed better than aged rats when trained with the same shock intensity. Increasing the shock duration for the aged rats eliminated the performance differences on the passive avoidance task between ages. Rats exposed to hypothermia showed poorer retention of the task (i.e., retrograde amnesia) than all control conditions. However, no age differences in the degree of amnesia induced by the hypothermia treatment were apparent once age groups were equated on the intensity of the amnesic agent (hypothermia) and degree of initial learning.