Photostimulated fos-like immunoreactivity in tuberal hypothalamus of photosensitive vs. photorefractory turkey hens.

Photorefractoriness in commercial turkey hens can be viewed as a failure of previously sexually stimulatory photoperiods to maintain egg production via activation of cGnRH I neurons, but the neural locus of photorefractoriness, i.e., where in the brain failure occurs, is not known. We used a c-fos antiserum that detects c-Fos and Fos-related antigens to characterize Fos-like immunoreactivity (FLI) as a measure of neuronal activation. FLI was measured in somatically mature, photosensitive hens (held on short photoperiods [8L:16D] for at least 10 weeks) before (non-photostimulated-photosensitive group) and after 48 h of exposure to long photoperiods (16L:8D; photostimulated-photosensitive group). We also measured FLI in hens that had become photorefractory, transferred to short photoperiods for 1 week--an insufficient time period to reverse photorefractoriness--and then exposed to long photoperiods for 48 h (photostimulated-photorefractory group). FLI was nearly absent in the tuberal hypothalamus of non-photostimulated-photosensitive hens but FLI was abundant in photostimulated-photosensitive hens. FLI was greatly reduced (P<0.01) in the rostral tuberal hypothalamus of photostimulated-photorefractory hens. All hens showed variable extra-tuberal FLI in locations associated with stress, e.g., paraventricular nucleus, lateral septal area, and nucleus taenia. Double-label fluorescence immunohistochemistry with c-fos antiserum and anti-Neu-N, a neuron-specific protein, showed that a substantial fraction of tuberal FLI-positive cells in photostimulated-photosensitive hens were neuronal. These results implicate neurons in the rostral tuberal hypothalamus as a potential neural locus of photorefractoriness, as FLI in this region appears coupled with cGnRH I activation in photostimulated-photosensitive but not photostimulated-photorefractory turkey hens.

Concentration of chicken gonadotropin-releasing hormones I and II in microdissected areas of turkey hen brain during the reproductive cycle.

Chicken gonadotropin-releasing hormones I and II (cGnRH I and II) were measured by radioimmunoassay (RIA) in extracts of microdissected regions of turkey hen brain (preoptic area [POA], region of periventricular nuclei [PHN], septum [SEP], hippocampus [HP], dorsomedial thalamus/habenula [DMT], midbrain central gray [MCG], and caudal lateral hypothalamus [LH]) at five stages of the reproductive cycle: before photostimulation, during egg laying, during incubation, during photorefractoriness, and after return to short daylengths. The highest concentration of cGnRH I occurred in PHN, followed by POA, SEP, DMT, HP, LH, and MCG, in decreasing order, whereas the highest concentration of cGnRH II occurred in SEP, followed by POA, DMT, HP, MCG, PHN, LH. These results agree, with some exceptions, with the distribution of fibers and cells as determined by immunohistochemistry. cGnRH II was from 1.3 to 24 times as abundant as cGnRH I in different brain areas. During incubation, cGnRH I concentrations were significantly elevated in the POA and cGnRH II levels were significantly elevated in HP; few other significant differences were detected. Correlation analysis detected occasional significant positive and negative correlations between cGnRH I and II concentrations in forebrain areas and MCG of laying birds and in PHN and LH of incubating birds. These results demonstrate an approximate correspondence between hormone concentrations measured in tissue extracts by RIA and immunohistochemistry and indicate an abundance of cGnRH II as compared with cGnRH I. cGnRH I and II concentrations did not, however, change in parallel in all brain areas, suggesting that these peptides do not function in an exactly parallel fashion. Thus, an extent to which cGnRH II is involved in gonadotropin release remains unresolved.

Avian gonadotropin-releasing hormones I and II in brain and other tissues in turkey hens.

1. Radioimmunoassays were developed for measuring avian gonadotropin-releasing hormones I and II (cGnRH I and II) in tissue extracts during the reproductive cycle. 2. Hypothalamic concentrations of cGnRH I and II were qualitatively similar being lowest in non-photostimulated hens, greater in laying hens and greatest in incubating hens. 3. cGnRH II concentrations were similar in paraolfactory lobe and hypothalamic fragments while lesser amounts were found in cerebrum, cerebellum, duodenum, shell gland, and pineal. 4. These results suggest that cGnRH II has unknown functions in turkeys quite distinct from traditional functions associated with GnRHs.