Sodium deficient rats are unmotivated by sodium chloride solutions mixed with the sodium channel blocker amiloride.
: Rats were made sodium deficient by furosemide injection and then offered 20 min of access to 0.05 M NaCl mixed with the sodium channel blocker amiloride. Compared with a sodium deficient control group that was also offered 0.05 M NaCl, these rats drank very little. A subsequent test conducted in the same manner with 20 min of access to 0.3 M NaCl mixed with amiloride produced similar results. It is concluded that amiloride blocks the neural information required for generating the attractive taste of NaCl to the sodium deficient rat.