Journal
DEVELOPMENTAL NEUROBIOLOGY
Volume 69, Issue 14, Pages 972-981Publisher
WILEY
DOI: 10.1002/dneu.20736
Keywords
hippocampal volume; neurogenesis; captivity; stress; learning and memory; food-storing bird
Categories
Funding
- National Institutes of Health [MH56093]
Ask authors/readers for more resources
In many naturalistic studies of the hippocampus wild animals are held in captivity. To test if captivity itself affects hippocampal integrity, adult black-capped chickadees (Poecile atricapilla) were caught in the fall, injected with bromodeoxyuridine to mark neurogenesis, and alternately released to the wild or held in captivity. The wild birds were recaptured after 4-6 weeks and perfused simultaneously with their captive counterparts. The hippocampus of captive birds was 23% smaller than wild birds, with no hemispheric differences in volume within groups. Between groups there was no statistically significant difference in the size of the telencephalon, or in the number and density of surviving new cells. Proximate causes of the reduced hippocampal volume could include stress, lack of exercise, diminished social interaction, or limited caching opportunity-a hippocampal-dependent activity. The results suggest the avian hippocampus-a structure essential for rapid, complex relational and spatial learning-is both plastic and sensitive, much as in mammals, including humans. (C) 2009 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Develop Neurobiol 69: 972-981, 2009
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