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Brainstem Cholinergic Modulation Of Muscle Tone In Infant Rats, Andrew J. Gall, Amy Poremba, Mark S. Blumberg
Brainstem Cholinergic Modulation Of Muscle Tone In Infant Rats, Andrew J. Gall, Amy Poremba, Mark S. Blumberg
Faculty Publications
In week-old rats, lesions of the dorsolateral pontine tegmentum (DLPT) and nucleus pontis oralis (PnO) have opposing effects on nuchal muscle tone. Specifically, pups with DLPT lesions exhibit prolonged bouts of nuchal muscle atonia (indicative of sleep) and pups with PnO lesions exhibit prolonged bouts of high nuchal muscle tone (indicative of wakefulness). Here we test the hypothesis that nuchal muscle tone is modulated, at least in part, by cholinergically mediated interactions between these two regions. First, in unanesthetized pups, we found that chemical infusion of the cholinergic agonist carbachol (22 mM, 0.1 µL) within the DLPT produced high muscle …