Control and 6-OHDA lesioned animals.

Rats were treated daily with saline or L-DOPA 6 mg/kg in combination with benserazide 12 mg/kg, s.c. for at least 21 days. All neurons were recorded 24 h after the last injection of saline or L-DOPA. Each value represents the mean ± SEM of (n) neurons. Each cell was recorded for 180 seconds. Number of animals included was n = 8, 7, 9, 8 and 3 for sham saline, sham L-DOPA, 6-OHDA saline, 6-OHDA L-DOPA (dyskinetic) and 6-ODA L-DOPA (non-dyskinetic), respectively. The parameter “Active neurons per track” was measured in 10 consecutive tracks of 8 and 4 animals in each group; * ppvs sham saline, ## pp0.001 vs. sham L-DOPA, && p0.01 and &&& p0.001 vs. lesion saline (one-way ANOVA followed by Bonferroni post-hoc test or Fisher’s test for “Neurons with burst-firing”).