Hypoxia-ischemia induced neurological dysfunction and brain injury in the neonatal rat

Bilateral carotid artery occlusion (BCAO) followed by exposure to a hypoxic condition (8% oxygen for 10 or 15 min) was performed in postnatal day 4 SD rats. Brain injury and myelination changes were examined on postnatal day 21 (P21) and tests for neurobehavioral toxicity were performed from P3 to P21. BCAO followed by 10 or 15 min hypoxic insult resulted in mild and severe, respectively, brain injury, reduction in mature oligodendrocytes and tyrosine hydroxylase positive neurons and impaired myelination as indicated by decreased myelin basic protein immunostaining in the P21 rat brain. Hypoxia-ischemia also affected physical development (body weight gain and eye opening) and neurobehavioral performance, such as righting reflex, wire hanging maneuver, cliff avoidance, locomotor activity, gait analysis, responses in the elevated plus-maze and passive avoidance. BCAO followed by 15 min of hypoxia caused more severely impaired neurobehavioral performance as compared with BCAO followed by 10 min of hypoxia in the rat. The overall results demonstrate that hypoxia-ischemia-induced brain injury not only persists, but also is linked with neurobehavioral deficits in juvenile rats. The present data also indicate that the degree of brain injury and the deficits of neurobehavioral performance in the rat are dependent on the hypoxic-ischemic condition, i.e., the exposure time to hypoxia.