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Studies of Perinatal Asphyxial Brain Injury in the Fetal Sheep

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Animal Models of Neurodevelopmental Disorders

Part of the book series: Neuromethods ((NM,volume 104))

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Abstract

In order to develop more effective ways of identifying, managing, and treating perinatal asphyxial brain injury, stable experimental models are essential. Although the outcome of clinical asphyxia is highly variable, modern imaging studies have distinguished two major patterns of injury in term infants, involving primary damage in either the parasagittal cortex or in the basal ganglia respectively. The present review describes the experimental preparation in detail, and the key experimental factors that determine the pattern and severity of brain injury in chronically instrumented fetal sheep, including the depth (“severity”), duration, and repetition of the insult, the maturity, and condition of the fetus. These models are valuable to dissect the pathogenesis of key clinical patterns of brain injury in a stable thermal and biochemical environment, and to test therapeutic interventions.

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Acknowledgments

The authors’ work reported in this review has been supported by the Health Research Council of New Zealand, Lottery Health Board of New Zealand, the Auckland Medical Research Foundation, the National Institutes of Health, and the March of Dimes Birth Defects Trust.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Physiology, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand

    Paul P. Drury, Laura Bennet, Lindsea C. Booth, Joanne O. Davidson & Guido Wassink

  2. Department of Physiology, Faculty of Medical and Health Sciences, University of Auckland, Private Bag 92019, Auckland, 1142, New Zealand

    Alistair Jan Gunn

Authors
  1. Paul P. Drury
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  2. Laura Bennet
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  3. Lindsea C. Booth
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  4. Joanne O. Davidson
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  5. Guido Wassink
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  6. Alistair Jan Gunn
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Alistair Jan Gunn .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Div. Pediatric Neurology, University of Alberta Dept. Pediatrics, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada

    Jerome Y. Yager

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Drury, P.P., Bennet, L., Booth, L.C., Davidson, J.O., Wassink, G., Gunn, A.J. (2015). Studies of Perinatal Asphyxial Brain Injury in the Fetal Sheep. In: Yager, J. (eds) Animal Models of Neurodevelopmental Disorders. Neuromethods, vol 104. Humana Press, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4939-2709-8_7

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4939-2709-8_7

  • Publisher Name: Humana Press, New York, NY

  • Print ISBN: 978-1-4939-2708-1

  • Online ISBN: 978-1-4939-2709-8

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