[DIFFERENCES IN ADAPTIVE BEHAVIORS IN ADOLESCENT MALE AND FEMALE RATS EXPOSED AS NEWBORNS TO INFLAMMATORY PAIN OR STRESS].

In adolescent rats (25-35-day-old) exposed as newborns (the first and repeatedly second days) to adverse impacts (inflammatory pain, stress of short-term maternal separation or their combination) sex dimorphism was revealed in pain behavior under conditions of similar peripheral inflammation. According to the priority data obtained, strengthening of pain-related response in the formalin test was found in males, whereas pain sensitivity in females was not changed, that is pain experienced by them as newborns did not affect the system reactivity to the same chemical irritant in the adolescent period. However, the rats of both sexes, who experienced short-term stress of maternal deprivation (60 min-during the first and the second days of life), displayed increased pain sensitivity in the formalin test. Combined effect of inflammatory pain and maternal deprivation in newborns did not alter pain sensitivity in both adolescent males and adolescent females. The male and female rats exposed as newborns to maternal deprivation displayed a decrease of the anxiety level in the elevated plus maze; the rats, exposed to each of the above-mentioned early impacts showed a decline of adaptive behavior in the forced swimming test; the males exposed to pain and combined impacts demonstrated impairment of spatial learning in Morris labyrinth. Thus, we pioneered in demonstrating sex differences in the effects of inflammatory pain in newborn pups on pain sensitivity in the formalin test in adolescent rats. Separation of the influence of early stress or pain was revealed in adolescent females in the formalin test: maternal deprivation induced hyperalgesia, whereas pain failed to change functional activity of the tonic nociceptive system.

[Long-term changes in adaptive behavior of rats after neonatal inflammatory pain].

In this study we addressed the tonic nociceptive system functional activity in the formalin test, anxiety- and depression-like behaviors and spatial learning in adolescent male rats exposed in the neonatal development to repeated inflammatory pain peripheral stimulation. The following groups of 25-day-old rats were used after being exposed on days 7 and 8 to: 1) formalin-induced inflammatory pain with maternal separation for 60 min (FS), 2) the same inflammatory pain stimulation without maternal separation (FWS), 3) physiological saline injection with maternal separation for 1 h (SS), 4) physiological saline injection without maternal separation (SWS) and 5) no stimulation (intact rats). The data obtained indicate that pain caused in 7-8-day-old rat pups by formalin injection into the plantar pad of the hind paw manifests by adolescence (day 25 as a strengthened inflammatory response under the analogous painful stimulation in the formalin test, adaptive behavior disorder in the forced swimming test and spatial learning disability. Our findings that a short-term repeated maternal deprivation of the 7-8-day-old rat pups without inflammatory pain increases the depression-like behavior are also of particular interest. Thus, a repeated inflammatory pain during the neonatal development brings about significant changes in the adaptive behaviors studied as well as in spatial learning in adolescent rats.

[Repeated inflammatory pain syndrome in newborn male rats changes adaptive behavior during adolescent period of development].

The study is devoted to the investigation of the effects of the repeated inflammatory pain syndrome of newborn male rat pups at the age of one and two days of life on characteristics of adaptive behaviors in the formalin test, the elevated-plus maze, the forced swim test and also in the swimming pool spatial test in these animals at the age of 25 days. The new data are enhancement of functional activity of the tonic nociceptive system, an increase in depression like behavior, impairment of spatial learning. A priority fact has been obtained that indicates that a short (60 min) repeated maternal deprivation of newborn rat pups (a stressful impact) without inflammatory noxious impact results in changes of the adaptive behaviors in 25-day-old animals. The evaluation of pain patterns organized at different levels of the central nervous system in the formalin test let us to find differences between effects of early painful and stressful impacts on the behavioral indices under study.