SPATIAL AND NONSPATIAL LEARNING IN THE RAT FOLLOWING LESIONS TO THE NUCLEUS LOCUS-COERULEUS

THE present experiment examined the effects of unilateral or bilateral locus coeruleus lesions on general activity, acquisition of a non-mon otonic serial pattern (14-0-3-7 food pellets, respectively), and respo nse learning acquisition in a Greek cross version of the Morris water maze. Sham-operated control rats were capable of tracking the elements of the serial pattern while rats with a unilateral locus coeruleus le sion were moderately impaired, and those with bilateral locus coeruleu s lesions were severely impaired. A similar pattern of working memory deficits emerged in an analysis of the response-learning data in the G reek cross. The results are discussed in terms of the current understa nding of norepinephrine and the locus coeruleus in learning and memory processes.