Developmental Nicotine Exposure disrupts dendritic arborization patterns of hypoglossal motoneurons in the neonatal rat

This study was undertaken to test the hypothesis that these functional consequences of DNE are accompanied by changes in the dendritic morphology of hypoglossal motoneurons. Hypoglossal motoneurons in brain stem slices were filled with neurobiotin during whole‐cell patch clamp recordings and subjected to histological processing to reveal dendrites. Morphometric analysis, including the Sholl method, revealed significant effects of DNE on dendritic branching patterns. In particular, whereas within the first 5 postnatal days there was significant growth of the higher‐order dendritic branches of motoneurons from control animals, the growth was compromised in motoneurons from neonates that were subjected to DNE. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.
Source: Journal of Neurobiology - Category: Neurology Authors: Tags: Research Article Source Type: research