Abstract:
Factors that alter neurogenesis are increasingly being investigated as possible treatments for human conditions such as chronic pain, depression, and PTSD. In this study we investigated the influence of housing and running condition on pain behavior and stress induced analgesia (SIA), to address possible connections between pain and neurogenesis in the dentate gyrus of the adult mouse hippocampus. Mice were either tested on an acute pain test (hotplate and tailwithdrawal) or a tonic pain test (formalin test). We report here that exercise and group housing had the effect of enhancing pain behavior, while SIA was moderated mostly by sex. Preliminary results from new granule cell counts indicate that neurogenesis was slightly enhanced in socially housed running animals, supporting the results generated by past research (Stranahan et al., 2006). Living environment can have a profound effect on biological and behavioral outcomes, both influencing changes in neural plasticity and neurogenesis, and peripheral changes in pain sensitivity. In order to further establish the connection between pain and neurogenesis, future research must investigate this relationship using a larger sample.
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