Central administration of glucose modifies brain amino acid metabolism in neonatal chicks

Abstract

Intracerebroventricular injection of glucose can induce a sedative effect in chicks under social isolation stress. In addition, central injection ofglucose improves memory formation in chicks in the passive avoidance task. In the present study, we confirmed that intracerebroventricular injection of glucose modified aspartate, arginine, glutamate, β-alanine, glycine and serine-ortho-phosphate levels of the telencephalon which are known to induce sedative effects in chicks. In addition, not only glutamate in the telenephalon, one ofwhose receptors is involved in the formation of memory in chicks, but also its metabolite glutamine was affected. These results suggest that some types of amino acid metabolism may be linked to the functions of glucose in the brain, attenuate the stress response and improve memory formation in chicks.