Chronic buspirone treatment normalizes open field behavior in olfactory bulbectomized rats: Assessment with a quantitative autoradiographic evaluation of the 5-HT1A binding sites

The olfactory bulbectomized (OBX) rat model of depression has been widely used in studies on the behavioral and neurochemical aspects of human depression. The objective of the present investigation was to assess open field (OF) activity and the brain regional 5-HT1A receptor densities of the sham operated (SHX) and OBX rats treated with saline (SHX-SAL, OBX-SAL), and either 10 mg/(kg day) (SHX-B10, OBX-B10) or 20 mg/(kg day) (SHX-B20, OBX-B20) of buspirone for 14 days, delivered by a subcutaneous osmotic minipump. Adult Sprague–Dawley rats were used for this experiment. The surgery was performed on the first day of the experiment and the rats were randomly assigned to either the SHX or OBX groups. The results of the OF tests were organized in eight groups. Following 14 days of treatment and the final OF tests, the rats were sacrificed and the brains were used for 5-HT1A receptor autoradiography using [3H]8-OH-DPAT. The data showed that the OF activities, 14 days following surgery, in the OBX rats were significantly elevated when compared to the SHX rats. In the OBX rats, only the 14-day treatment with 20 mg/(kg day) of buspirone normalized the elevated OF activity, the same dose shown previously to be needed for the normalization of the regional 5-HT synthesis. A significant reduction in the number of 5-HT1A receptor sites was found in most brain regions in the OBX rats when compared to the SHX rats. Data also show that the regional density of the 5-HT1A receptors in OBX-SAL treated rats is lower than that of the SHX-SAL rats. The 14-day treatment with either 10 or 20 mg/(kg day) of buspirone reduced the 5-HT1A receptors in most brain regions of the SHX rats, without an obvious dose-dependent effect of the buspirone. The comparison between the OBX-B20 and control (SHX-B20) rats suggests that the buspirone treatment resulted in a regional balance in the 5-HT1A sites. A dose dependent reduction in the density of 5-HT1A sites was observed in the sham rats, but the buspirone treatment had very little effect on the density of the 5-HT1A receptors in the OBX rats. From these observations, we conclude that the antidepressant effects of buspirone in the OBX rat model of depression are likely mediated through the fine tuning of the regional imbalance of 5-HT1A receptors with even increases of about 20% in some limbic regions. The data suggest that the neurochemical effects of antidepressants should be studied in animal models of depression rather than in normal rats.