Effects of a ketogenic diet on hippocampal plasticity in freely moving juvenile rats

Ketogenic diets are low-carbohydrate, sufficient protein, high-fat diets with anticonvulsant activity used primarily as a treatment for pediatric epilepsy. The anticonvulsant mechanism is thought to involve elevating inhibition and/or otherwise limiting excitability in the brain. Such a mechanism, however, might also significantly affect normal brain activity and limit synaptic plasticity, effects that would be important to consider in the developing brain. To assess ketogenic diet effects on synaptic transmission and plasticity, electro-physiological recordings were performed at the perforant path/dentate gyrus synapse in awake, freely-behaving juvenile male rats. Electrodes were implanted 1 week prior to recording. Animals were fed regular chow or a ketogenic diet ad libitum for 3 weeks before recording. Although the ketogenic diet did not significantly alter baseline excitability (assessed by input-output curves) or short-term plasticity (using the paired-pulse ratio), it did reduce the magnitude of long-term potentiation at all poststimulation timepoints out to the last time measured (48 h). The results suggest an effect of ketogenic diet-feeding on the induction magnitude but not the maintenance of long-term potentiation. The lack of effect of the diet on baseline transmission and the paired-pulse ratio suggests a mechanism that limits excitation preferentially in conditions of strong stimulation, consonant with clinical reports in which the ketogenic diet alleviates seizures without a major impact on normal brain activity. Limiting plasticity in a seizure-susceptible network may limit seizure-induced epileptogenesis which may subserve the ongoing benefit of the ketogenic diet in epilepsy.