Accepted_test

Changes in behavior and the stress-responsive system in the aging SHR and WKY rats after prolonged individual housing

by Mikhail Stepanichev | Diana Mamedova | Olga Nedogreeva | Viktoria Ovchinnikova | Yulia Moiseeva | Lia Tret’yakova | Natalia Gulyaeva | Institute of Higher Nervous Activity and Neurophysiology, Russian Academy of Sciences | Institute of Higher Nervous Activity and Neurophysiology, Russian Academy of Sciences | Institute of Higher Nervous Activity and Neurophysiology, Russian Academy of Sciences | Institute of Higher Nervous Activity and Neurophysiology, Russian Academy of Sciences | Institute of Higher Nervous Activity and Neurophysiology, Russian Academy of Sciences | Institute of Higher Nervous Activity and Neurophysiology, Russian Academy of Sciences | Institute of Higher Nervous Activity and Neurophysiology, Russian Academy of Sciences

Abstract ID: 205

Event: BGRS-abstracts

Sections: Section “Genetics and systems biology of aging”

Social isolation or loneliness in elderly is a serious problem in many developed and developing countries. Social isolation has objective and subjective dimensions that significantly influences its consequences for each individual. Prolonged social isolation is believed to negatively impact mental health, inducing psychiatric impairments and disturbances of cognitive functions, specifically in older adults. The aim of the present study was to investigate the effects of prolonged social isolation on anxiety, depressive-like, and social behavior in the aging spontaneously hypertensive rats (SHR) and normotensive Wistar Kyoto (WKY). We also studied some biochemical indices of the stress-responsive system in these rats during and after the end of the isolation period. We can assume that in the aging SHR rats long-term social isolation significantly impaired cognitive abilities. Social isolation negatively influenced cognitive flexibility in both normotensive and hypertensive animals. Thus, hypertension significantly contributed to the effects of social isolation on cognitive functions but not on depressive-like behavior. Despite the adrenal gland hypertrophy in the SHRs, corticosterone levels remained stable within the period of isolation but the expression of nuclear glucocorticoid receptor (Nr3c1) mRNA in the adrenals was lower in the SHR as compared to WKY rats. Further, these impairments were not directly related to functions of the stress-responsive system.

The study is supported by the RSF (No. 22-15-00132).