Potential of the rat model of conditioned gaping to detect nausea produced by rolipram, a phosphodiesterase-4 (PDE4) inhibitor

Rolipram, a phosphodiesterase-4 (PDE4) inhibitor, is of current interest as a cognitive enhancer and as a treatment for inflammatory diseases. Originally developed as an anti-depressant, rolipram's efficacy was limited due to its side effects of nausea and vomiting. The experiments reported here evaluated the potential of rolipram to produce conditioned gaping (a selective measure of nausea in rats) to a flavor in the taste reactivity test (Experiment 1) and to a context (Experiment 2). In Experiment 1, rats were intra-orally infused with 17% sucrose solution prior to being injected with rolipram (Vehicle, 0.03, 0.1 or 0.3 mg/kg). Following 3 conditioning trials, rats conditioned with 0.3 mg/kg rolipram displayed conditioned gaping reactions during the infusion of sucrose. In Experiment 2, rats received 4 conditioning trials in which they were injected with 0.3 mg/kg rolipram and placed into a distinctive chamber. At test, when returned to the chamber rats displayed conditioned gaping. These results demonstrate the ability of the conditioned gaping model to detect the nauseating properties of a rolipram-paired flavor (Experiment 1) and rolipram-paired context (Experiment 2), further validating the potential use of the conditioned gaping model as a pre-clinical screening tool to evaluate the side effect of nausea produced by newly developed drugs.