SLEEP 2011 Abstract Supplement

A. Basic Science IX. Learning, Memory and Cognition
ferent color, different shape from true shapes), and same color foils (SC:
same color, different shape). Mixed-model ANOVAs focused on recognition
of true shapes and false positive rates.
Results: There was no effect of night, type of SD, or gender on true
shape recognition (d-prime). Lure rates were unaffected by night and
type of SD, but women identified more lures than men regardless of
night or type of SD (p=.05). Total foil rates (DC+SC) were significantly
greater after SD (p=0.031), but were not affected by type of SD or gender.
Specifically, SC foil rates were higher during SD than WR (p=.024).
There was no difference for DC foil rates.
Conclusion: Contrary to the word version of this task, these data show
object memory is not impaired, and FM for objects is not enhanced, with
SD. Gender did not influence the effects of SD, although women did
report more FM than men. The fact SC, but not DC, foils were endorsed
more after SD suggests SD impairs finer discriminations between targets
and distractors.
0255
AVOIDANCE LEARNING-INDUCED SLEEP ALTERATION IN
RATS
Li C, Chang F
Veterinary Medicine, National Taiwan University, Taipei, Taiwan
Introduction: The benefit of sleep to consolidation of declarative memory
and non-declarative memory has been supported by both human and
animal studies. Understanding the alterations of sleep architecture after
learning is important to unveil the role of sleep in memory processing.
Present study was designed to identify changes in the post-training sleep
architecture induced by avoidance learning in rats, and how the alterations
in sleep parameters correlate with behavioral performance. In addition,
previous studies focused on the effect of sleep on certain types
of memory, while the sleep alterations induced by one type of memory
may influence the learning for another type of memory. We are currently
investigating whether the consolidation of conditioning memory facilitates
other types of associative memory.
Methods: Male Sprague-Dawley rats were randomly assigned to the
control and learning groups. Rats in the learning groups were trained
with shuttle avoidance task for two sessions with a five-day interval.
EEGs were recorded and analyzed to assess the changes in sleep architecture
after learning.
Results: The behavioral results have shown that the avoidance performance
improved at the third day of training. After a 5-day retention
period, the performance remained the same as that in the first training
day. EEG analysis of six 4-hour time blocks has revealed the rapid eye
movement (REM) sleep windows, the period of increased REM sleep,
were during 13-16 hours of the first post-training day and 6-10 hours of
the second post-training day.
Conclusion: Our results suggest that REM sleep may play a role in
memory consolidation of avoidance learning.
0256
A NOVEL MURINE FEAR CONDITIONING MODEL USING
MILD HYPERCAPNIA AS A CONDITIONED STIMULUS TO
STUDY SLEEP DISTURBANCES IN PTSD
Flilippone AB 1,2 , Romano LC 2 , Balbir A 3 , Germain A 1 , O’Donnell CP 2
1
Psychiatry, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA, USA, 2 Medicine,
University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA, USA, 3 Department of
Defense, National Intrepid Center of Excellence, Bethesday, MD, USA
Introduction: Sleep disturbances are a common outcome of PTSD,
and animal fear conditioning (FC) models are increasingly used to explore
the mechanistic relationships between PTSD and sleep. This study
compared the physiologic and sleep responses of classic tone-footshock
(T+FS) with a novel model using mild transient hypercapnia (HC)
paired with footshock (HC+FS).
Methods: Experiments were conducted in adult male FVB/nJ mice
chronically instrumented with arterial catheters and polysomnographic
electrodes. After recovery from surgery and acclimation to the experimental
chamber, two separate groups of animals were exposed to repeated
episodes of either T+FS (30 second duration; n = 16) or HC+FS
(60 second duration; 2.5% increase in CO2; n = 16). We assessed blood
pressure, heart rate, and EMG (activity) during training and sleep before
and after training.
Results: In the T+FS paradigm, blood pressure and heart rate were unaffected
by tone, but EMG activity was significantly increased by tone
(107±12 to 147±21 EMG activity % quiet wake; p