Effect of Ppropofol on spatial associative memory capacity in rats using morris water maze

Abstract

Objective To study the clinical effects of low-dose and high-dose injection of propefol on spatial associative memory capacity in rats. Methods 30 rats were randomly divided into 3 groups: control, clin-ical low-dose propofol (0.1 mg/kg·min) group and clinical high-dose propofol (0.5 mg/kg·min) group. The experi-ments including 4-days place swimming and 1-day space exploration began from the day after injection. In place swimming group, rats were trained in morris water maze from Ⅰ,Ⅱ,Ⅲ quadrant. Latency period, swimming length and swimming velocity were recorded. In space exploration group, untrained rats were put into the maze from the Ⅳ quadrant and swimming time, first circling point value and total scores were recorded. Results At the first two days of place swimming test there were no differences between the control group and the low-dose group in la-tency, swimming length and swimming velocity(P<0.05); while high-dose group's latency period and swimming length were obviously longer than that of control(P<0.05). At the second two days there were no differences among the three groups(P<0.05). In the space exploration test, total scores of control, low-dose group and high-dose group were: 2 509.36±190.72, 2 378.55±210.69 and 1 954.85±174.20, respectively. There was no difference be-tween low-dose group and the control group(P<0.05). Total scores of the high-dose group were much lower than that of control. Conclusion The clinical low-dose propofol injection has no effects on the spatial associative memory capacity and spatial memory capacity of rats. The clinical high-dose propofol injection affects the rats' spatial memory capacity during the first two days but has no effects after two days, while the clinical high-dose propofol injection reduces the rats' spatial associative memory capacity. Key words: Propofol; Rats; Spatial associative memory capacity; Morris water maze; Spatial memory capacity