Effects of morphine treatment in female rats on diffents periods of pregnancy: physical and neurobehavioral development in offspring

• Grant number: 11/11845-6
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Scientific Initiation
• Start date: December 01, 2011
• End date: May 31, 2013
• Field of knowledge: Biological Sciences - Pharmacology - Neuropsychopharmacology
• Principal Investigator: Elizabeth Teodorov
• Grantee: Jullie Rosana de Almeida Hernandes
• Host Institution: Centro de Matemática, Computação e Cognição (CMCC). Universidade Federal do ABC (UFABC). Ministério da Educação (Brasil). Santo André , SP, Brazil

Abstract

Maternal behavior (CM) is a specific type of parental behavior, and investment of all direct care (searching, feeding, and cleaning) and indirect (aggression and nest building) presented by the female neonate enabling the organism to survive. When this behavior does not occur, ie, when females cannot adequately care for their offspring by preventing the survival of their offspring, the species is headed for extinction. The CM persists for periods ranging from species to species depending on the acquisition of autonomy of offspring. Appears more developed in mammals than in other animal groups and more elaborate in species that have offspring with a greater degree of immaturity at birth, usually related to motor control and body temperature. It is known that the degree of development of offspring at birth has a significant influence on the CM. The offspring of rodents were quite dependent at birth, which becomes excellent models for the study of this behavior, and the laboratory mouse is the most widely used experimental subject for the study of CM. The emergence and maintenance of CM are controlled by the interaction of environmental, biochemical, hormonal, and neural. Previous studies have shown that stimulation opioidérgica resulting from treatment with morphine in effects generates late breeding females differentiated according to the physiological state at the time of treatment, even in their offspring. This project aims to investigate whether treatment with morphine at different times of pregnancy promotes changes in different CM in lactating rats. Changes in CM have been known to compromise the physical and neurobehavioral aspects/molecular mechanisms of the offspring, parameters in this study.(AU)