The Effect of Inactivation of the Nucleus Reuniens on Spatial Working Memory

The Nucleus Reuniens (RE) of the ventral midline thalamus
has been shown to have extensive reciprocal
innervations with the medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC)
and the hippocampus (HF) in the brain of the rat.
Both structures are essential for encoding, retrieval,
and delayed spatial working memory. The (RE) is believed
to play a vital role in facilitating cognitive function
and affective behavior and has been shown to
be critical for a variety of working memory tasks. In
this study we tested Long Evan rats using a T-maze.
For each trial the rats were required to alternate between
the left and right goal arms with a delay period
in between randomized intervals of 30s, 60s, or 120s.
After two consecutive testing days of 80% the rats
were infused with muscimol procaine, and saline. We
expect that the effect of reversible inactivation of RE
will demonstrate a significant decline in performance
of the task.