Chapter 7 Studies on host afferent inputs to fetal striatal transplants in the excitotoxically lesioned striatum

Abstract

Publisher Summary The grafts of fetal striatal tissue can effectively ameliorate the behavioral impairments in both conditioned and unconditioned behaviors that result from striatal lesions induced with excitotoxic amino acids. This chapter describes and aims to investigate the extent of the possible ingrowth from the host brain into the striatal transplants in the excitotoxically lesioned striatum. The results suggest that fetal striatal grafts in the ibotenic acid-lesioned striatum receive afferent host brain inputs from the substantia nigra (SN), the thalamus and to some extent also from the amygdala, entorhinal cortex and the dorsal raphe nuclei. The functional importance of the various putative host brain afferents is yet largely unknown. However, it has been shown that the dopaminergic afferents form abundant synaptic contacts with neurons within the striatal grafts, and pharmacological evidence is available showing that striatal graft function is under the functional regulation of the afferent dopaminergic input. The combined anatomical and behavioral data indicate that the intrastriatal grafts become anatomically and functionally integrated with the host brain.