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BRIEF RESEARCH REPORT article

Front. Mol. Neurosci.
Sec. Brain Disease Mechanisms
Volume 17 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/fnmol.2024.1458070
This article is part of the Research Topic Imaging Brain Network and Brain Energy Metabolism Impairments in Brain Disorders View all articles

Concentrations of glutamate and N-acetylaspartate detected by magnetic resonance spectroscopy in the rat hippocampus correlate with hippocampal-dependent spatial memory performance

Provisionally accepted
João M. Duarte João M. Duarte 1,2*
  • 1 Wallenberg Centre for Molecular Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, Lund University, Lund, Sweden
  • 2 Diabetes and Brain Function Unit, Department of Experimental Medical Science, Faculty of Medicine, Lund University, Lund, Sweden

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    Magnetic resonance spectroscopy (MRS) has been employed to investigate brain metabolite concentrations in vivo, and they vary during neuronal activation, across brain activity states, or upon disease with neurological impact. Whether resting brain metabolites correlate with functioning in behavioural tasks remains to be demonstrated in any of the widely used rodent models. This study tested the hypothesis that, in the absence of neurological disease or injury, the performance in a hippocampal-dependent memory task is correlated with the hippocampal levels of metabolites that are mainly synthesized in neurons, namely N-acetylaspartate (NAA), glutamate and GABA. Experimentally naïve rats were tested for hippocampal-dependent spatial memory performance by measuring spontaneous alternation in the Y-maze, followed by anatomical magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and magnetic resonance spectroscopy (MRS) in the hippocampus and cortex. Memory performance correlated with hippocampal concentrations of NAA (P=0.024) and glutamate (P=0.014) but not GABA. Concentrations of glutamate in the cortex also correlated with spatial memory (P=0.035). In addition, memory performance was also correlated with the relative volume of the hippocampus (P=0.041). Altogether, this exploratory study suggests that levels of the neuronal maker NAA and the main excitatory neurotransmitter glutamate are associated with physiological functional capacity.

    Keywords: Neurochemicals, Metabolites, Glutamate, GABA, Naa

    Received: 01 Jul 2024; Accepted: 07 Aug 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 Duarte. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: João M. Duarte, Wallenberg Centre for Molecular Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, Lund University, Lund, Sweden

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