Cerebellar cortical AMPA-kainate receptor blockade prevents performance of classically conditioned nictitating membrane responses

Classical conditioning of the nictitating membrane-eye blink response of rabbits is a simple form of associative motor learning. Lesion studies have shown that performance of learned responses is dependent on the cerebellum, but they have not shown whether there is storage of memories within the cerebellum or distinguished the roles of the cerebellar cortex and nuclei. Reversible inactivations of the cerebellar nuclei have directly implicated the cerebellum in the acquisition of nictitating membrane conditioning, but previously the cerebellar cortex has not been reversibly inactivated to assess its contribution to the performance or acquisition of conditioned responses. Here we use the water-soluble disodium salt of 6-cyano-7-nitroquinoxaline-2,3-dione (CNQX) reversibly to block cerebellar cortical AMPA-kainate receptors in lobule HVI and quantitative autoradiography to map its distribution. Conditioned responses are completely, but reversibly, abolished for 10-60 min depending on the concentration of the CNQX infusion and its location within HVI. Zebrin immunohistochemistry was used to define the optimal cortical infusion site that, we suggest, corresponds to the location of the eye blink control regions. We confirm that areas in HVI are essential for the expression of classically conditioned nictitating membrane responses, and we establish a method to analyze the role of cerebellar cortex in the acquisition of this form of motor learning.