3α-diol administration decreases hippocampal PKA (II) mRNA expression and impairs Morris water maze performance in adult male rats

The effect of testosterone and its metabolites on learning and memory has been the subject of many studies. This study used the Morris water maze task to investigate the effect of intra-hippocampal injection of 3 alpha-diol (one of the metabolites of testosterone) on acquisition stage of spatial memory in adult male rats. During the experiment we observed that 3a-diol, significantly impaired Morris water maze performance in treated rat's compared with controls. Because signaling event mediated by protein kinase A (PICA) especially PICA (II) are critical for many neuronal functions such as learning and memory, the hippocampus was analyzed for mRNA expression of PICA (II) using TaqMan real time RT-PCR The results indicated that the transcription levels of PICA (II) were significantly decreased in animals treated with 3 alpha-diol compared with controls. Thus, the findings suggest that administration of 3 alpha-diol in hippocampus of adult male rats impairs memory function, possibly via down-regulation of PICA. (C) 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.