1. Cytoarchitectural characteristics associated with cognitive flexibility in raccoons
- Author
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Jack Drake, Joanna Jacob, Shylo R. Johnson, Amanda Rzucidlo, Emily Ploppert, Tim Landis, Sarah Benson-Amram, Molly M. Hyer, Stan Gehrt, Suzana Herculano-Houzel, Mary Ann Raghanti, Anderson Miller, Rachel Fanelli, Nick R. Natale, Bilal Hindi, Amy T. Gilbert, Chris Anchor, Sarah Daniels, Molly Kent, Kelly Lambert, and Annie Lai
- Subjects
Male ,0301 basic medicine ,Hippocampus ,Cell Count ,Biology ,Somatosensory system ,Translational Research, Biomedical ,03 medical and health sciences ,Cognition ,0302 clinical medicine ,Cortex (anatomy) ,Cortical magnification ,medicine ,Animals ,Gyrification ,Problem Solving ,Cerebral Cortex ,Neurons ,General Neuroscience ,Dentate gyrus ,Cognitive flexibility ,Brain ,Somatosensory Cortex ,030104 developmental biology ,medicine.anatomical_structure ,Cytoarchitecture ,Dentate Gyrus ,Female ,Raccoons ,Neuroscience ,Psychomotor Performance ,030217 neurology & neurosurgery - Abstract
With rates of psychiatric illnesses such as depression continuing to rise, additional preclinical models are needed to facilitate translational neuroscience research. In the current study, the raccoon (Procyon lotor) was investigated due to its similarities with primate brains, including comparable proportional neuronal densities, cortical magnification of the forepaw area, and cortical gyrification. Specifically, we report on the cytoarchitectural characteristics of raccoons profiled as high, intermediate, or low solvers in a multi-access problem-solving task. Isotropic fractionation indicated that high-solvers had significantly more cells in the hippocampus (HC) than the other solving groups; further, a nonsignificant trend suggested that this increase in cell profile density was due to increased non-neuronal (e.g., glial) cells. Group differences were not observed in the cellular density of the somatosensory cortex. Thionin-based staining confirmed the presence of von Economo neurons (VENs) in the frontoinsular (FI) cortex, although no impact of solving ability on VEN cell profile density levels was observed. Elongated fusiform cells were quantified in the hippocampus dentate gyrus where high-solvers were observed to have higher levels of this cell type than the other solving groups. In sum, the current findings suggest that varying cytoarchitectural phenotypes contribute to cognitive flexibility. Additional research is necessary to determine the translational value of cytoarchitectural distribution patterns on adaptive behavioral outcomes associated with cognitive performance and mental health. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.
- Published
- 2021
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