Audiogenic stress is known to activate the hypothalamo-pituitary-adrenocortical (HPA) axis in rats. The goal of the present study was to determine whether the medial geniculate nuclei (including all auditory nuclei of the thalamus), which are obligatory relays in the transmission of auditory information to the forebrain, are critically involved in HPA activation by audiogenic stress. To this en...

Highland JA, Weiser MJ, Hinds LR, Spencer RL. CRTC2 activation in the suprachiasmatic nucleus, but not paraventricular nucleus, varies in a diurnal fashion and increases with nighttime light exposure. Am J Physiol Cell Physiol 307: C611–C621, 2014. First published July 30, 2014; doi:10.1152/ajpcell.00319.2013.—Entrainment of the intrinsic suprachiasmatic nucleus (SCN) molecular clock to the lig...

The hypothalamus comprises alar, basal, and floor plate developmental compartments. Recent molecular data support a rostrocaudal subdivision into rostral (terminal) and caudal (peduncular) halves. In this context, the distribution of neuronal populations expressing somatostatin (Sst) mRNA was analyzed in the developing mouse hypothalamus, comparing with the expression pattern of the genes Ortho...

Quantitative autoradiography was performed to investigate the mapping of prostaglandin E2 binding sites in the Macaca fuscata fuscata diencephalon. Autoradiographs were prepared by incubation of 10-micron-thick serial frozen sections with 3H-prostaglandin E2 and were processed by using a rotating drum-scanner and a computer-assisted image-processing system with 3H-microscales as standards. The ...

The modification in the activity of noradrenergic neurons projecting to the hypothalamus and the pituitary-adrenal response during morphine withdrawal as well its correlation with alterations in corticotropin-releasing factor (CRF) and vasopressin (AVP) content in different brain areas was analyzed. Male rats were implanted with placebo (naïve) or morphine (tolerant/dependent) pellets for 7 day...

introduction: the septal region is part of the telencephalon and is a component of the limbic system. the lateral septal area (ls); largest nuclear mass in this region, plays a pivotal role in various physiological processes, such as aggression, emotion, thermoregulation, water and food intake and sexual behaviour. to support the functional analysis of this brain area in the rat, the sources of...

The prolactin receptor (PRL-R) has recently been identified in various hypothalamic nuclei of female rats. In this study, expression of both the short- and long-forms of PRL-R mRNA was investigated in 11 microdissected hypothalamic nuclei of ovariectomized, estrogen-treated rats. Specific nuclei were micropunched from 300-micrometer thick frozen coronal sections with autoclaved stainless steel ...

The present study assessed whether the baroreflex inhibition elicited by electrical stimulation of the hypothalamic paraventricular nucleus (PVN) involves altered activity in the nucleus of the solitary tract (NTS). Unit recordings were made from 107 neurons in the NTS in anesthetized rabbits. Intravenous phenylephrine was used to induce a pressor response and to activate baroreflexes. Of the n...