The influence of some neurotransmitter agonists and antagonists on the response of hippocampal units and the cortical EEG to ethanol in the awake rat.

The spontaneous activity of single unit populations in the dorsal hippocampus and the cortical EEG were monitored in the awake rat. Experiments consisted of three consecutive recording periods; a drug-free baseline period, a pretreatment period and an ethanol period. Pretreatment with doses of dopaminergic or cholinergic agonists, which produced decreases in unit rate and an awake EEG attenuated the inhibitory effect of ethanol on hippocampal unit activity and reduced the amount of high-amplitude, slow (HAS), drowsy-state activity. GABAergic and adrenergic antagonists, which increased hippocampal unit rate, did not attenuate and sometimes enhanced the ethanol-induced inhibition in firing rate but had little additional effect on the EEG. These results point to the involvment of hippocampal neurons in those behavioural aspects of ethanol intoxication mediated by activity in the neurotransmitter systems examined here.