RT journal article
T1 Sexual differences in locus coeruleus neurons and related behavior in C57BL/6J mice
A1 Mariscal Ramírez, Patricia
A1 Bravo García, Lidia
A1 Llorca Torralba, Meritxell
A1 Razquin, Jone
A1 Miguelez, Cristina
A1 Suárez-Pereira, Irene
A1 Berrocoso Domínguez, Esther María
A2 Neurociencias
A2 Psicología
A2 Anatomía PatológicaBiología Celular, Histología, Historia de la Ciencia, Medicina Legal y Forense y Toxicología
AB Background In addition to social and cultural factors, sex diferences in the central nervous system have a criti‑cal infuence on behavior, although the neurobiology underlying these diferences remains unclear. Interestingly,the Locus Coeruleus (LC), a noradrenergic nucleus that exhibits sexual dimorphism, integrates signals that arerelated to diverse activities, including emotions, cognition and pain. Therefore, we set-out to evaluate sex diferencesin behaviors related to LC nucleus, and subsequently, to assess the sex diferences in LC morphology and function.Methods Female and male C57BL/6J mice were studied to explore the role of the LC in anxiety, depressive-likebehavior, well-being, pain, and learning and memory. We also explored the number of noradrenergic LC cells, theirsomatodendritic volume, as well as the electrophysiological properties of LC neurons in each sex.Results While both male and female mice displayed similar depressive-like behavior, female mice exhibited moreanxiety-related behaviors. Interestingly, females outperformed males in memory tasks that involved distinguishingobjects with small diferences and they also showed greater thermal pain sensitivity. Immunohistological analysisrevealed that females had fewer noradrenergic cells yet they showed a larger dendritic volume than males. Patchclamp electrophysiology studies demonstrated that LC neurons in female mice had a lower capacitance and that theywere more excitable than male LC neurons, albeit with similar action potential properties.Conclusions Overall, this study provides new insights into the sex diferences related to LC nucleus and associatedbehaviors, which may explain the heightened emotional arousal response observed in females
PB BMC
SN 2042-6410
YR 2023
FD 2023-09-28
LK http://hdl.handle.net/10498/30120
UL http://hdl.handle.net/10498/30120
LA eng
DS Repositorio Institucional de la Universidad de Cádiz
RD 10-may-2026