The Journal of Neurophysiology Vol. 78 No. 5 November 1997, pp. 2475-2482
Copyright ©1997 The American Physiological Society

Interaction Between Tetanus Long-Term Potentiation and Hypoxia-Induced Potentiation in the Rat Hippocampus

M. Lyubkin¹, D. M. Durand¹, and M. A. Haxhiu²

¹ Departments of Biomedical Engineering and Neurosciences and ² Department of Medicine, Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, Ohio 44106

Lyubkin, M., D. M. Durand, and M. A. Haxhiu. Interaction between tetanus long-term potentiation and hypoxia-induced potentiation in the rat hippocampus. J. Neurophysiol. 78: 2475-2482, 1997. The interaction between tetanus-induced long-term potentiation (LTP) and hypoxia-induced potentiation was investigated by performing extracellular recordings in the CA1 region of rat hippocampus using a two-pathway design. Hippocampal slices were placed in an interface chamber containing artificial cerebrospinal fluid (ACSF) solution with high magnesium concentration. Hypoxia was induced by replacing the 5% CO₂-95% O₂ gas mixture with 5% CO₂-95% N₂ for 2 min. Tetanus-LTP was induced with 1-s, 100-Hz current pulses. Significant hypoxia-induced potentiation of the slope of the dendritic excitatory postsynaptic potential (EPSP) was found in ACSF containing 2 mM of magnesium 2, 27 ± 10% (mean ± SE; n = 16; P < 0.01) with no change in the mean amplitude of the presynaptic volley. All experiments in which a stable control baseline was obtained were used for data analysis. The data show that short episodes (2 min) of hypoxia can induce LTP of the -amino-3-hydroxy-5-methyl-4-isoxazolepropionic acid-mediated synaptic transmission. The present study demonstrated that after tetanus-LTP, 33 ± 3% (n = 10; P < 0.01), hypoxia further potentiated the field EPSP slopes by a mean value of 16 ± 5% (n = 10; P < 0.05). Moreover, using a two-pathway design, we showed that hypoxia produced similar potentiation in both the control [19 ± 5%; n = 10; P < 0.01) and tetanus-induced LTP pathway, and the total potentiation produced by a combination of tetanus then hypoxia, 63 ± 13% (n = 10; p < 0.01), was significantly larger (P < 0.01) than hypoxia alone. These data suggest that hypoxia-induced potentiation is additive with tetanus-LTP. Occlusion experiments were performed to verify whether the mechanisms responsible for hypoxia-induced potentiation are independent of preexisting synaptic levels induced by high-frequency stimulation. Hypoxia produced significant potentiation (23 ± 7%; n = 7; P < 0.05) after successful occlusion of the LTP pathway. Therefore, because the magnitude of hypoxia-induced potentiation is both independent of preexisting synaptic levels and also additive, synaptic specificity associated with LTP is preserved. The magnitude of tetanus-LTP induced 20 min after hypoxia (15 ± 4%; n = 10) was significantly smaller (P < 0.01) relative to LTP after normoxic conditions (33 ± 3%; n = 10). Additionally, hypoxia blocked the transient, robust potentiation occurring during the early phase of LTP induction. This study suggests that although hypoxia modifies neuronal processing by general excitation, synaptic specificity associated with tetanus-LTP still is preserved. However, hypoxia can disrupt neuronal processing by inhibiting new modification of synaptic transmission.

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