Neuroinflammation Contributes to High Salt Intake-Augmented Neuronal Activation and Active Coping Responses to Acute Stress

High dietary salt intake increases risk of stress-related neuro psychiatric disorders. Here, we explored the contribution of high dietary salt intake-induced neuroin flammation in key stress-responsive brain regions, the hypo thalamic paraven tricular nucleus and basolateral amygdala, in promoting exaggerated neuronal activation and coping behaviors in response to acute psychogenic stress. Mice that underwent high dietary salt intake exhibited increased active stress coping behaviors during and after an acute swim stress, and these were reduced by concurrent administration of minocycline, an inhibitor of microglial activation, without affecting body fluid hyper osmolality caused by high dietary salt intake. Moreover, minocycline attenuated high dietary salt intake-induced increases of paraven tricular nucleus tumor necrosis factor-α, activated microglia (ionized calcium-binding adaptor molecule 1), and acute swim stress-induced neuronal activation (c-Fos). In the basolateral amygdala, similar effects were observed on ionized calcium-binding adaptor molecule 1+ and c-Fos+ counts, but not tumor necrosis factor-α levels. These data indicate that high dietary salt intake promotes neuro inflammation, increasing recruitment of neurons in key stress-associated brain regions and augmenting behavioral hyper-responsivity to acute psychological stress.