Quantitative age related changess in the nucleus raphe dorsalis of the rat

Introduction. About 50% of serotonergic neurons of the CN.s exist in th e dorsal ra phe nucle us. To cha nge the seroto nin's ra te of C N.S indu ces man y disorde rs. Due to age increase. morphologic cha nges in number and diamet er of den drit es. numbe r of their spines, numbe r of fibers a nd ce llula r endings in the nucleus raphe dorsa lis a nd rate of their sta ining are observed. T he aim of thi s research is to survey of a ny cha nges in ne uron s numbers a nd volume of nucleus ra ph e dorsalis in ag ing. Materials and Methods. In this research 15 fe ma le a lbino rats with age of 3 days. 2 and 12 months were used. T he brain of these rats fixed by pe rfusio n method with BOEI N solution, th en the spe cimens st ain ed by Cluve r and Barrera me thod. The number of ce lls and volume of the nucle us raphe dorsa lis have been calculate d hy using eye pe ace micros cope. T he dat a were a na lysed by Kraskul-Wallis test and P < 0.05 was conside re d as significa nt. Results. Micros copic exa mina tio ns have heen show n that with incr easi ng age the number of neurons of the nucleus ra phe dorsalis and the volume of them significa ntly dec reased (P< 0.05). Conclusion. T hese q uantitative changes in higher ages. make the negative effects in vita l ac tivity of the ne uro ns, which may indu ce many disorde rs.