Stimulation of the superior cerebellar peduncle during the development of amygdaloid kindling in rats

Abstract

Cerebellar manipulations have been used successfully in some intractable epileptic patients, however, their intrinsic mechanisms are not fully understood. To further clarify the cerebellar participation in epilepsy, we stimulated 10 rats with 100 Hz, 20 μA at the superior cerebellar peduncle (SCP) during amygdaloid kindling. Results were compared to 10 rats with an electrode placed at the SCP without stimulation and 10 rats without electrodes at the SCP used as control. We found that SCP stimulation increased the theta and alpha rhythms at the contralateral motor cortex. Such a stimulation produced hypertonicity of the forelimbs and tremor of the head. In this condition, we found that each of the behavioral stages during amygdaloid kindling in the SCP stimulated rats was reached earlier, while the amygdaloid electrographic afterdischarges (ADs) were longer during the first and shorter in the final trials as compared to controls. Moreover, amygdaloid ADs recorded exclusively during the behavioral stage-5 were significantly shorter than those recorded in the control conditions. We suggest that SCP stimulation could change the customary electrographic and convulsive expression of amygdala kindling in such a manner as to initially facilitate the limbic seizures and impede the secondary generalized seizures.