Study of behavior of rats with gluten-induced enteropathy

Association of different psychological and neurological disturbances with gluten intake in coeliac patients was repeatedly described. In the present study gluten-induced enteropathy was elicited in rats by prolonged intragastric administration of gliadin from birth to 10 weeks. Various neurological (contact and visual placing reactions, equilibrium on horizontal bar) and behavioral tests (open field and Morris water maze task) were used to assess the possible deficits. No substantial differences were found in the behavior of rats fed with gliadin compared with those fed with bovine serum albumin (control group). The only difference found between control and experimental rats was that gliadin-fed rats showed slightly higher emotionality in the open field test. It is concluded that prolonged application of gliadin to young rats at enteropathy-inducing dosages does not modify their behavior

Impairment of place navigation of rats in the Morris water maxe by intermitten light is inversely related to the duration of the flash

The relative contribution of allocentric and egocentric orientation to place navigation was studied in Long-Evans rats trained in the Morris water maze in permanent light, permanent darkness or flickering light (1 Hz, flash duration 25, 100, 300, 500 and 800 ms). After 3 days of training (nine blocks of four trials), escape latencies were 38 and 7 s in the dark- and light-trained groups, respectively, and corresponded to the light-dark ratio in the flicker-trained groups. Shorter-than-predicted latencies in the 25- and 100-ms groups reflected visual persistence of 200 ms. The difference between flickerin light (100 ms) and permanent light performance during acquisition of place navigation to a new target was significantly smaller in rats previously trained in light than in naive animals. It is concluded that longer flash duration gives the animals more opportunities to locate levant landmarks and to estimate their distance