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Pavlovian fear conditioning in mice anesthetized with halothane
R Pang1, H Turndorf, D Quartermain
1Department of Anesthesiology, New York University Medical Center, New York 10010, USA.
Abstract:
Pavlovian fear conditioning was employed to investigate learning during general anesthesia. Mice were given three CS-UCS presentations while anesthetized with halothane. The CS was a 10-s tone and the UCS a 0.4-mA shock delivered intramuscularly to the hindlimbs via needle electrodes. Anesthetized control groups received either CS only, UCS only, or CS followed by a 3-min delayed UCS. Strength of fear conditioning was assessed by measuring duration of suppression of drinking induced by tone presentation in a test session conducted 24 h after training. Results showed that mice trained under anesthesia exhibited a significant amount of conditioned suppression relative to the anesthetized control groups. These results show that Pavlovian fear conditioning can occur under halothane anesthesia.