Elsevier

Neuroscience Letters

Volume 330, Issue 2, 20 September 2002, Pages 171-174
Neuroscience Letters

Dopamine modulation of activity of cat sensorimotor cortex neurons during conditioned reflexes

https://doi.org/10.1016/S0304-3940(02)00775-9Get rights and content

Abstract

The effects of iontophoretic application of dopamine and selective D1 or D2 dopamine receptor agonists and antagonists on impulse activity of neurons of the deep layers of the sensorimotor cortex of cat were investigated during performance of a conditioned paw movement task. The application of dopamine, Quinpirole (selective D2 receptor agonist) or SKF 38393 (selective D1 receptor agonist) increased both background (P<0.001) and evoked impulse activity (P<0.05 for selective agonists). Selective D2 and D1 receptor antagonists (Sulpiride and SKF 83566, respectively) both increased the latency of neural responses and significantly increased the latency of the conditioned paw movements (P<0.01). These data suggest that during natural physiological functions subcortical dopamine neurons provide facilitation of activity pyramidal neurons of sensorimotor cortex.

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Acknowledgments

This study was partially supported by INTAS-OPEN 97-0173 and SNSF 7-IP-062620 grants. We thank Professor Brian Hyland (University of Otago, New Zealand) for his useful remarks.

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