Effects of the Novel NMDA Receptor Antagonist Gacyclidine on Recovery From Medial Frontal Cortex Contusion Injury in Rats

Gacyclidine, a novel, noncompetitive NMDA receptor antagonist, was injected (i.v.) into rats at three different doses to determine if the drug could promote behavioral recovery and reduce the behavioral and anatomical impairments that occur after bilateral contusions of the medial frontal cortex (MFC). In the Morris water maze,contused rats treated with gacyciidine at a dosage of 0.1 mg/kg performed better than their vehicle-treated conspecifics. Rats given gacyclidine at either 0,3 or 0.03 mg/kg performed better than brain-injured controls, but not as well as those treated with 0.1 mg/kg. Counts of surviving neurons in the nucleus basalis magnoceilularis (NBM) and the medial dorsal nucleus (MDN) of the thalamus were used to determine whether gacyclidine treatment attenuated secondary cell death. In both the NBM and the MDN, the counts revealed fewer surviving neurons in untreated contused rats than in gacyclidine-treated rats. Increases in the size and number of microglia and astrocytes were observed in the striatum of gacyclidinetreated contused brains. Although most consequences of MFC contusions were attenuated, we still observed increases in ventricle dilation and thinning of the cortex. In fact, the ventricles of rats treated with 0.1 mg/kg of gacyclidine were larger than those of their vehicle treated counterparts, although we observed no behavioral impairment

Impacts of the Indonesian Economic Crisis: Price Changes and the Poor

The recent financial crisis in Indonesia has resulted in dramatic price increases. Using very recent data, we investigate whether these price increases have impacted the cost-of-living of poor households in a disproportionately harsh way. We find that the poor have indeed been hit hardest. Just how hard the poor have been hit, though, depends crucially on where the household lives, whether the household is in a rural or urban area, and just how the cost-of-living index is computed. What is clear is that the notion that the very poor are so poor as to be insulated from international shocks is simply wrong. Rather, in the Indonesian case, the very poor appear the most vulnerable.http://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/39635/3/wp249.pd