Research
An operant conditioning experiment is being performed. What is the level at which the effort in doing something exceeds the reinforcing effect of the action?
Breakpoint. This monitors how willing an animal is to get a drug. Could start out at 1 lever press for 1 mL of cocaine and go to 100 lever presses for 1 mL of cocaine.
Acetycholine is secreted by _____ neurons in the peripheral nervous system.
Efferent neurons.
Think of "A"fferent as "A"pproaching nervous system and "E"fferent as "E"xiting nervous system. Also makes sense as Acetylcholine is released with muscle movement.
Glutamate is an ______ neurotransmitter?
Excitatory amino acid neurotransmitter
Which GABA receptor is metabotropic?
GABA-B
As an addiction develops, there is an increase in ____ the drug, but not ____ the drug.
wanting, liking
Why do we use animal models instead of humans for some research studies?
Animals share genetic similarity(mice is 85%). Also unethical to do experiments where we do a brain lesion in a human or administer drugs to them.
How was the heart experimented on by Otto Loewi to discover ACh?
Loewi isolated two frog hearts in separate chambers with a shared fluid. He stimulated the vagus nerve of the first heart, slowing its beat, then transferred the fluid to the second heart, which also slowed down. This provided proof that chemical substances convey nerve signals to organs.
Most glutamate uptake is performed by these glial cells.
Astrocytes
Is glutamate needed to synthesize GABA or is GABA needed to synthesize glutamate?
Glutamate and GAD form GABA.
What is type of stimulus for LTP induction. Is it caused by a disease with a similar name?
Tetanic stimulus. This is a series of fast-firing electricity. It has nothing to do with tetanus.
Good experimental design should minimize external factors in causing an observed effect. Sam is testing for the presence of Vitamin C after applying a drug to neuronal cells. For his control, he has picked out orange juice and water. Which type of control is each liquid?
Orange juice is a positive control. It is known to contain Vitamin C in high amounts. Water is a negative control. It is just composed of H2O.
What are the two types of ACh receptors? Describe
Muscarinic. GPCR and slower and excitatory or inhibitory.
Nicotinic. LGIC and fast and requires 2 acetycholine molecules.
What 2 essential compounds(precursor and enzyme) are needed for synthesis of glutamate?
Glutaminase and glutamine
GABA is needed to stop a glutamate overload. What does this prevent?
Seizures and excitotoxicity/cell death. GABA only functions as a neurotransmitter unlike glutamate.
Is dopamine the pleasure neurotransmitter? Explain.
DA in the NAcc goes up when drugs are taken. DA goes up with a tail pinch or stress though too.
What is the difference between transgenic and knock in/out mouse?
Transgenic mice have the gene randomly inserted. Knock in and knock out specifically target a region to insert a gene in.
What marker would you use to identify cholinergic neurons specifically? Does it have any inhibitors?
ChAT and no
There are 3 VGLUT transporters. Which one(s) would be ideal to use as a marker for glutamatergic neurons and why not the other?
VGLUT1 or 2. It is expressed the least with other neurotransmitters. VGLUT3 is sometimes expressed with other markers like VMAT. This implies glutamate is stored as a co-transmitter with other -ergic neurons.
What drug elevates extracellular GABA levels and is prescribed to treat epilepsy?
Tiagabine. Inhibits the GAT re-uptake transporters.
What did Koob and Le Moal propose regarding the double-edged sword of drug taking?
The within-systems and between-systems processes. Within systems is when the drug someone is taking slowly loses effect. At the same time, the negative symptoms get worse and worse when the user is trying to quit.
Researchers are wondering what research method to use to activate certain populations of neurons(chemogenetics or optogenetics).
Study casual relationships instead correlational relationships?
Uses light?
Uses drugs?
Controls temporal aspect better?
Has better spatial control?
Both
Optogenetics(Flashes light which activates specific neurons that have been injected with virus containing a rhodopsin)
Chemogenetics(Uses a specific drug formula to work on a specific set of neurons)
Optogenetics(controls down to millisecond)
Chemogenetics(More specific)
Give a disease caused by overactivity of acetycholine vs underactivity.
Overactivity: Parkinson's
Underactivity: Alzheimer's.
Explain the NMDA and AMPA receptor process in as much depth as possible in the context of LTP(Long Term Potentiation)
Sodium passes through AMPA. Depolarization occurs and the Mg2+ block is removed on the NMDA receptor. Calcium enters the neuron, and activates a second messenger through the calmodulin system This phosphorylates existing AMPA receptors, and also creates new AMPA receptors.
Induction: NMDA
Expression: AMPA
BZDs, barbituates, and alcohol work on what GABA receptor? How do each of them affect the receptor?
GABA-A. BZDs increase the probability that the receptor is open. Barbituates increase how long the receptor is open. Alcohol increases probability and length. Don't take all of them at once!
Refer to the emailed figure. Which graph refers to the dopaminergic response of an animal when it hears a tone it has heard before at t1, but it recieves nothing at t2?
C.