IRIS Institutional Research Information System - AIR Archivio Istituzionale della Ricerca

IRIS è il sistema di gestione integrata dei dati della ricerca (persone, progetti, pubblicazioni, attività) adottato dall'Università degli Studi di Milano.

AIR nasce in UNIMI nel 2006 con lo scopo di raccogliere, documentare e conservare le informazioni sulla produzione scientifica dell'Università degli Studi di Milano e costituisce di fatto l'Anagrafe della ricerca dell'Ateneo.

Background: Nicotine withdrawal syndrome is a major clinical problem. Animal models with sufficient predictive validity to support translation of pre-clinical findings to clinical research are lacking. Aims: We evaluated the behavioural and neurochemical alterations in zebrafish induced by short- and long-term nicotine withdrawal. Methods: Zebrafish were exposed to 1 mg/L nicotine for 2 weeks. Dependence was determined using behavioural analysis following mecamylamine-induced withdrawal, and brain nicotinic receptor binding studies. Separate groups of nicotine-exposed and control fish were assessed for anxiety-like behaviours, anhedonia and memory deficits following 2-60 days spontaneous withdrawal. Gene expression analysis using whole brain samples from nicotine-treated and control fish was performed at 7 and 60 days after the last drug exposure. Tyrosine hydroxylase (TH) immunoreactivity in pretectum was also analysed. Results: Mecamylamine-precipitated withdrawal nicotine-exposed fish showed increased anxiety-like behaviour as evidenced by increased freezing and decreased exploration. 3H-Epibatidine labeled heteromeric nicotinic acethylcholine receptors (nAChR) significantly increased after 2 weeks of nicotine exposure while 125I-αBungarotoxin labeled homomeric nAChR remained unchanged. Spontaneous nicotine withdrawal elicited anxiety-like behaviour (increased bottom dwelling), reduced motivation in terms of no preference for the enriched side in a place preference test starting from Day 7 after withdrawal and a progressive decrease of memory attention (lowering discrimination index). Behavioural differences were associated with brain gene expression changes: nicotine withdrawn animals showed decreased expression of chrna 4 and chrna7 after 60 days, and of htr2a from 7 to 60 days.The expression of c-Fos was significantly increased at 7 days. Finally, Tyrosine hydroxylase (TH) immunoreactivity increased in dorsal parvocellular pretectal nucleus, but not in periventricular nucleus of posterior tuberculum nor in optic tectum, at 60 days after withdrawal. Conclusions: Our findings show that nicotine withdrawal induced anxiety-like behaviour, cognitive alterations, gene expression changes and increase in pretectal TH expression, similar to those observed in humans and rodent models.

Conservation of mechanisms regulating emotional-like responses on spontaneous nicotine withdrawal in zebrafish and mammals / L. Ponzoni, G. Melzi, L. Marabini, A. Martini, G. Petrillo, M. Teh, J.V. Torres-Perez, S. Morara, C. Gotti, D. Braida, C.H. Brennan, M. Sala. - In: PROGRESS IN NEURO-PSYCHOPHARMACOLOGY & BIOLOGICAL PSYCHIATRY. - ISSN 0278-5846. - 111(2021 Dec 20), pp. 110334.1-110334.13.

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