Journal
CHEMICAL SENSES
Volume 32, Issue 1, Pages 57-64Publisher
OXFORD UNIV PRESS
DOI: 10.1093/chemse/bjl036
Keywords
alarm pheromone; anxiety; stress-induced hyperthermia; VNX; vomeronasal organ
Ask authors/readers for more resources
Previously, we reported that male Wistar rats release alarm pheromone from their perianal region, which aggravates stress-induced hyperthermia (SIH) in pheromone-recipient rats. The subsequent discovery that this pheromone could be trapped in water enabled us to expose recipients to the pheromone in their home cages. Despite its apparent influence on autonomic and behavioral functions, we still had no clear evidence as to whether the alarm pheromone was perceived by the main olfactory system (MOS) or by the vomeronasal system. In this study, we investigated this question by exposing 3 types of recipients to alarm pheromone in their home cages: intact males (Intact), vomeronasal organ-excised males (VNX), and sham-operated males (Sham). The Intact and Sham recipients showed aggravated SIH in response to alarm pheromone, whereas the VNX recipients did not. In addition, the results of the habituation/dishabituation test and soybean agglutinin binding to the accessory olfactory bulb verified the complete ablation of the vomeronasal organ (VNO) with a functional MOS in the pheromone recipients. These results strongly suggest that male rats perceive alarm pheromone with the VNO.
Authors
I am an author on this paper
Click your name to claim this paper and add it to your profile.
Reviews
Recommended
No Data Available