Effect of treatment with escitalopram on behavioral alterations resulting from maternal deprivation at postnatal day 9 in Wistar rats

• Grant number: 15/24745-0
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Master
• Effective date (Start): March 01, 2016
• Effective date (End): November 30, 2017
• Field of knowledge: Biological Sciences - Pharmacology - Neuropsychopharmacology
• Principal Investigator: Deborah Suchecki
• Grantee: Natália Cristina Zanta
• Host Institution: Escola Paulista de Medicina (EPM). Universidade Federal de São Paulo (UNIFESP). Campus São Paulo. São Paulo , SP, Brazil

Abstract

The neonatal period is characterized by intense neuronal plasticity. During this period, the Central Nervous System is not totally developed yet, showing intense neuronal proliferation and neural activity, being much vulnerable to adverse external factors, which could permanently modify central nervous system compounds, notedly the Hypothalamus-Pituitary-Adrenal axis regulation, the main stress response system. These modifications could contribute to trigger future emotional alterations, like anxiety and depression. Experimental models, as maternal deprivation, have been used to study the influence of early stress on the development of psychiatric disorders. Neonatal stress is performed during the Stress-Hyporresponsive Period, characterized for a reduced release of corticosterone (CORT) in stressful situations. One of the most robust and replicable consequences of maternal deprivation is the adrenal desinhibition that begin to secrete large amounts of CORT responding to mild and moderate stressors. In a previous study, that aimed to determine if a saline injection in association with maternal deprivation would trigger CORT response and lead to more robust and permanent alterations than each stressor separately. In this study, it was shown that maternal deprivation on postnatal day 9 impaired the performance on social behavior, according to depressive and anxiety profiles and reduced the visits on the centre of the Open Field, comparable to anxiety-like traits, while the saline injection on PDN 10 (independently of previous maternal deprivation) reduced the entries in the open arms of the Elevated Plus Maze and the consumption in the Negative Sucrose Contrast Test, indicating an anxious profile. Therefore, the face validity of this model was established and in the presented project aims to do the pharmacological validation, by evaluating if drugs used in the therapeutic of emotional diseases (serotonin reuptake inhibitor escitalopram) could reverse the behavioral alterations observed on the neonatal stress model. (AU)

Scientific publications

(References retrieved automatically from Web of Science and SciELO through information on FAPESP grants and their corresponding numbers as mentioned in the publications by the authors)

HENN, LORENA; ZANTA, NATALIA C.; GIRARDI, CARLOS EDUARDO N.; SUCHECKI, DEBORAH. Chronic Escitalopram Treatment Does Not Alter the Effects of Neonatal Stress on Hippocampal BDNF Levels, 5-HT(1A)Expression and Emotional Behaviour of Male and Female Adolescent Rats. Molecular Neurobiology, v. 58, n. 3, p. 926-943, MAR 2021. (15/24745-0, 15/26364-4)