Susceptibility to hippocampal kindling seizures is increased in aging C57 black mice

• Published in: IBRO reports Vol. 3; no. C; pp. 33 - 44
• Main Authors: Stover, Kurt R., Lim, Stellar, Zhou, Terri-Lin, Stafford, Paul M., Chow, Jonathan, Li, Haoyuan, Sivanenthiran, Nila, Mylvaganam, Sivakami, Wu, Chiping, Weaver, Donald F., Eubanks, James, Zhang, Liang
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: England Elsevier Ltd 01.12.2017; Elsevier
• Subjects: Aging; EEG; Epilepsy; Hippocampus; Kindling; Mice; Aging; Mice; Kindling; EEG; Epilepsy; Hippocampus
• ISSN: 2451-8301; 2451-8301
• DOI: 10.1016/j.ibror.2017.08.001

[Display omitted] •Hippocampal kindling by daily stimulation conducted in aging and young mice.•Stimulation parameters were comparable in the two groups of mice.•No significant age difference in cumulative afterdischarges to stage 3–5 seizures.•Longer afterdischarges and faster seizure progression observed in the aging mice.•Aging mice may have increased susceptibility to hippocampal kindling seizures. The incidence of seizures increases with old age. Stroke, dementia and brain tumors are recognized risk factors for new-onset seizures in the aging populations and the incidence of these conditions also increased with age. Whether aging is associated with higher seizure susceptibility in the absence of the above pathologies remains unclear. We used classic kindling to explore this issue as the kindling model is highly reproducible and allows close monitoring of electrographic and motor seizure activities in individual animals. We kindled male young and aging mice (C57BL/6 strain, 2–3 and 18–22 months of age) via daily hippocampal CA3 stimulation and monitored seizure activity via video and electroencephalographic recordings. The aging mice needed fewer stimuli to evoke stage-5 motor seizures and exhibited longer hippocampal afterdischarges and more frequent hippocampal spikes relative to the young mice, but afterdischarge thresholds and cumulative afterdischarge durations to stage 5 motor seizures were not different between the two age groups. While hippocampal injury and structural alterations at cellular and micro-circuitry levels remain to be examined in the kindled mice, our present observations suggest that susceptibility to hippocampal CA3 kindling seizures is increased with aging in male C57 black mice.