Abstract
Dietary thiamin deficiency decreased the performance of rats on a standardized tight rope test. After 10 d of treatment, the scores of one-third of the treated rats declined by four or more points. Injections of thiamin or the acetylcholinesterase inhibitor, physostigmine, partially ameliorated the behavioral deficits; physostigmine was as effective as thiamin. Nicotinic (mecamylamine) and muscarinic (atropine) cholinergic antagonists that act on the central and peripheral nervous system blocked the beneficial effects of physostigmine. However, the peripheral muscarinic cholinergic blocker methatropine did not alter physostigmine’s actions. Thus, dietary thiamin deprivation appears to produce a physiologically important cholinergic deficit in the central nervous system.
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Gibson, G.E., Pelmas, C. & Blass, J.P. A central cholinergic deficit in rats with dietary thiamin deficiency. Neurochemical Pathology 1, 125–135 (1983). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02834193
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02834193