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D Wirtshafter

Publications and source records attributed to D Wirtshafter.

68 records · Page 4Linked to original sources
PubMed1982

Ingestive behaviors of rats with electrolytic median raphe lesions maintained on a food deprivation schedule.

The current study examines the effects of electrolytic median raphe lesions on the feeding and drinking behaviors of rats maintained on a 23-hr food deprivation schedule. Measurement of food intake during the feeding period indicated no difference between the two groups but lesioned animals showed significantly more spillage than controls. Furthermore, measurement of water intakes indicated that median raphe lesioned rats consume significantly less water than controls in the absence of food and come to ingest virtually all of their daily fluid intake during the feeding period. Additionally, rats with lesions of this nucleus take significantly more drinks during the feeding period, often punctuating their meal with short draughts. Since similar behaviors are seen following the destruction of certain hypothalamic and limbic nuclei anatomically related to the median raphe, it is possible that these syndromes share an anatomical basis.

Animals↗
PubMed1982

A comment on the practice of expressing food and water intake as a proportion of body weight.

It has been a common practice to express food and water intake as a proportion of body weight in an attempt to control for weight differences between individuals or treatment groups. It is argued here that, unless extreme caution is taken, this procedure is likely to result in misleading conclusions. Intake per kilogram body weight is not simply a measure of intake and it should not be treated as though it were. Furthermore, use of this technique to measure ingestion is more likely to introduce spurious relations between consumption and body weight than it is to eliminate relations which are actually present. We feel, therefore, that this measure should, at most, be used as a supplement to raw measures of food and water intake.

Aging↗
PubMed1982

Platelet monoamine oxidase activity and behavioral response to pharmacotherapy in psychiatric patients.

Platelet monoamine oxidase (MAO) levels were determined for drug-free psychiatric inpatients who were subsequently treated with neuroleptics, tricyclics, or lithium. Weekly, time-sampled recordings of specific behaviors were also made during both drug-free and medication periods. Significant correlations were obtained between MAO levels and changes in behavior scores subsequent to drug administration. For six of the seven recorded behaviors, correlations for patients treated with lithium vs. tricyclics were in the opposite direction. The results suggest that MAO levels, measured during a drug-free period, can predict some of the behavioral responses to antidepressant medications.

Adult↗
PubMed1981

Sustained intracerebroventricular infusion of brain fuels reduces body weight and food intake in rats.

Long-term infusion of glucose, beta-hydroxybutyrate, and glycerol into the third ventricle of the rat brain caused a stabilization of body weight at a lower than normal level. Among the glucose- and glycerol-treated animals this weight loss was caused in part by temporary hypophagia. Among the animals treated with beta-hydroxybutyrate the weight loss was unaccompanied by a reduction in food intake. The results are consistent with the view that the systems controlling food intake and body weight are sensitive to the availability of brain fuels. They are not consistent however, with the view that these control systems monitor calories independently of their source.

3-Hydroxybutyric Acid↗
PubMed1978

Nucleus accumbens lesions reduce amphetamine hyperthermia but not hyperactivity.

Electrolytic lesions of the nucleus accumbens were found to produce an increase in spontaneous locomotion; additionally, these lesions attenuated the hyperthermic, but not the hyperkinetic, actions of d-amphetamine. These results suggest that while dopamine release from the mesolimbic system may underlie amphetamine-induced hyperthermia, other structures must also be involved in amphetamine-induced hypermotility.

Animals↗
PubMed1977

Body weight: reduction by long-term glycerol treatment.

Elevation of body glycerol concentration by multiple daily injections of glycerol was shown to lead to hypophagia and body weight loss followed by normal food intake and normal rate of body weight increase in rats. Termination of injections was followed by hyperphagia and an accelerated rate of growth. These findings suggest that the blood glycerol concentration plays an important role in the control of body weight and may be one signal by which the central nervous system monitors body lipid content.

Animals↗
PubMed1977

Set points, settling points, and the control of body weight.

Recently a number of investigators have suggested that body weight may be controlled by a neural system which contains a reference or set point. The finding that the body weight level which animals will defend can be altered by lesions of the lateral and ventromedial hypothalamus has been taken to provide support for this claim. In this paper we describe a simple feedback control model which contains no set point, and yet is able to account in full for these and other data which have been cited in support of the existence of a body weight set point. Since such a model exists it appears to be unnecessary and unparsimonious to introduce the concept of a neural set point to explain the fact that body weight maintains a relatively constant value which is defended against certain types of challenges. Constancy and defense of body weight are at best only prima facie evidence for the existence of a neural set point controlling body weight.

Animals↗