Abstract
A semi-synthetic diet containing 20% polyunsaturated fat (soybean) oil was fed to young male hooded rats for 21 days. These animals exhibited improved performance on an environmentally-cued testing paradigm which is thought to reflect cognitive learning skills (i.e., Place Navigation Water Task). Other rats fed the same base diet but containing 20% saturated fat (lard) showed no such improvement compared to chow-fed (4.5% mixed fat) controls. The animals fed soybean oil also exhibited a transient resistance to extinguish this learning. This improved learning could not be explained by changes in general motor activity, basal body temperature, energy consumption, body weight, or in the brain activity of choline acetyltransferase, the marker enzyme for cholinergic neurons. These findings constitute the first evidence that short-term variations in the quality of dietary fat can enhance mammalian learning.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 1789-1794 |
| Number of pages | 6 |
| Journal | Life Sciences |
| Volume | 38 |
| Issue number | 19 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - 12 May 1986 |
| Externally published | Yes |
Bibliographical note
Funding Information:This research was supported by funds from the Clarke Institute of Psychiatry (D.V.C. and S.J.K.), The Ontario Ministry of Health (a Career Scientist Award to S.J.K.), The Ontario Mental Health Foundation and The Human Nutrition Research Council of Ontario (C.E.L.-G.). During the tenure of this research, S.Y. was the recipient of a B. Rosenstadt Professorship in Health Research in the Department of Nutritional Sciences, Faculty of Medicine, University of Toronto. His present address is: Department of Psychology, Bar Ilan University, Ramat Gan, Israel. We thank Dr. G. H. Anderson, Chairman, Department of Nutritional Sciences end Associate Dean of Research, University of Toronto, for his continued support of this project. We also thank Ms. P. Rawling for her excellent secretarial assistance.
Funding
This research was supported by funds from the Clarke Institute of Psychiatry (D.V.C. and S.J.K.), The Ontario Ministry of Health (a Career Scientist Award to S.J.K.), The Ontario Mental Health Foundation and The Human Nutrition Research Council of Ontario (C.E.L.-G.). During the tenure of this research, S.Y. was the recipient of a B. Rosenstadt Professorship in Health Research in the Department of Nutritional Sciences, Faculty of Medicine, University of Toronto. His present address is: Department of Psychology, Bar Ilan University, Ramat Gan, Israel. We thank Dr. G. H. Anderson, Chairman, Department of Nutritional Sciences end Associate Dean of Research, University of Toronto, for his continued support of this project. We also thank Ms. P. Rawling for her excellent secretarial assistance.
| Funders | Funder number |
|---|---|
| Clarke Institute of Psychiatry | |
| Human Nutrition Research Council of Ontario | |
| Ontario Ministry of Health | |
| Ontario Mental Health Foundation |
