PSYCHOLOGY MASTER'S THESIS ABSTRACT

L. Matthew Law
MA-Research
Summer 2007

Differences in Response to Injury Between Food-Storing and Non-Storing Birds

    Food-storing birds show a peak in hippocampal neurogenesis during the fall concomitant with a peak in food storing, a hippocampus-dependent activity.  Although established in other species, it was not known whether storers would respond to hippocampal injury with an increase in cell proliferation.  Food-storing chickadees and non-storing juncos were wild caught in Maine during the fall.  Half received unilateral hippocampal lesions.  All were injected with the mitotic marker BrdU then euthanized 7 days later.  Unlesioned chickadees had more BrdU-IR cells than unlesioned juncos in the hippocampus and stem cell rich subventricular zone (SVZ).  Lesioned juncos showed proliferation in the injured and intact hippocampus and pSVZ.  Unlike juncos, chickadees showed a localized response to injury restricted to the hippocampus.  Because non-storing birds respond to injury with more proliferation than that exhibited by chickadees, the results may reflect the food storing demands on the hippocampus and the concomitant neurogenesis in the fall.

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