Early Life Stress Alters Expression of Glucocorticoid Stress Response Genes and Trophic Factor Transcripts in the Rodent Basal Ganglia

Tran, Cynthia Haidee; Weickert, Cynthia Shannon; Weickert, Thomas; Sinclair, Duncan

doi:10.3390/ijms23105333

Cited by 6 publications

(4 citation statements)

References 91 publications

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“…Indeed, there is a striking overlap between stress and reward neurobiology, which recruits the same brain regions including the ventral striatum, amygdala, and medial prefrontal cortex (5,49,50). Moreover, these regions are dense in terms of glucocorticoid receptors (60), which were found to be altered following early life stress exposure in animals (61) and humans (62). Therefore, it is not surprising that we identified that adversities were associated with disrupted EV and PE signaling in the reward network.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 81%

Early life adversities affect expected value signaling in the adult brain

Sacu

Dubois

Aggensteiner

et al. 2023

Preprint

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Background: Early adverse experiences are assumed to affect fundamental processes of reward learning and decision-making. However, computational neuroimaging studies investigating these circuits are sparse and limited to studies that investigated adversities retrospectively in adolescent samples. Methods: We used prospective data from a longitudinal birth cohort study (n=156, 87 females, mean age=32.2) to investigate neurocomputational components underlying reinforcement learning in an fMRI-based passive avoidance task. We applied a principal component analysis to capture common variation across seven prenatal and postnatal adversity measures. The resulting adversity factors (factor 1: postnatal psychosocial adversities and prenatal maternal smoking, factor 2: prenatal maternal stress and obstetric adversity, and factor 3: lower maternal stimulation) and single adversity measures were then linked to computational markers of reward learning (i.e. expected value, prediction errors) in the core reward network. Results: Using the adversity factors, we found that adversities were linked to lower expected value representation in striatum, ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC) and anterior cingulate cortex (ACC). Expected value encoding in vmPFC further mediated the relationship between adversities and psychopathology. In terms of specific adversity effects, we found that obstetric adversity was associated with lower prediction error signaling in the vmPFC and ACC, whereas lower maternal stimulation was related to lower expected value encoding in the striatum, vmPFC, and ACC. Conclusions: Our results suggested that adverse experiences have a long-term disruptive effect on reward learning in several important reward-related brain regions, which can be associated with non-optimal decision-making and thereby increase the vulnerability of developing psychopathology.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 81%

Early life adversities affect expected value signaling in the adult brain

Sacu

Dubois

Aggensteiner

et al. 2023

Preprint

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“…In addition, PFC is also crucial for sensorimotor gating, a brain function differently affected by CN and/or ESI in a sex- and age-dependent manner ( Bratzu et al, 2023 ). Since early postnatal experiences and rearing conditions can induce sexually dimorphic changes in CB1R expression, endocannabinoids and/or corticosterone levels ( Brown and Grunberg, 1995 ; Suárez et al, 2009 , 2010 ; Viveros et al, 2009 ; Dow-Edwards et al, 2016 ; Ramírez-López et al, 2017 ; Portero-Tresserra et al, 2018 ; Caradonna et al, 2022 ; Tran et al, 2022 ; Walker et al, 2022 ) we assessed the effects of CN or ESI in both female and male offspring to detect potential sex differences. Furthermore, the potential impact of CN condition on the effects of early social isolation has been assessed.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Outcomes of early social experiences on glucocorticoid and endocannabinoid systems in the prefrontal cortex of male and female adolescent rats

Rullo,

Losapio,

Morosini

et al. 2023

Front. Cell. Neurosci.

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Social and emotional experiences differently shape individual’s neurodevelopment inducing substantial changes in neurobiological substrates and behavior, particularly when they occur early in life. In this scenario, the present study was aimed at (i) investigating the impact of early social environments on emotional reactivity of adolescent male and female rats and (ii) uncovering the underlying molecular features, focusing on the cortical endocannabinoid (eCB) and glucocorticoid systems. To this aim, we applied a protocol of environmental manipulation based on early postnatal socially enriched or impoverished conditions. Social enrichment was realized through communal nesting (CN). Conversely, an early social isolation (ESI) protocol was applied (post-natal days 14–21) to mimic an adverse early social environment. The two forms of social manipulation resulted in specific behavioral and molecular outcomes in both male and female rat offspring. Despite the combination of CN and ESI did not affect emotional reactivity in both sexes, the molecular results reveal that the preventive exposure to CN differently altered mRNA and protein expression of the main components of the glucocorticoid and eCB systems in male and female rats. In particular, adolescent females exposed to the combination of CN and ESI showed increased corticosterone levels, unaltered genomic glucocorticoid receptor, reduced cannabinoid receptor type-1 and fatty acid amide hydrolase protein levels, suggesting that the CN condition evokes different reorganization of these systems in males and females.

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“…These GR primary targets trigger physiological and pathological responses of GCs. Therefore, we used the GR gene expression in VTA (VTA-GR) to investigate the effect of different variable light intensity lighting programs on the welfare of birds as described in other animal studies (Daftary et al, 2009;Mizoguchi et al, 2021;Tran et al, 2022). The lower level of GR in 20-lx-and VL-treated birds indicates that the VTA-DAergic system is necessary to initiate fear extinction and reveal a crucial role of DA neurons in this form of safety learning.…”

Section: Regulation Of Welfare-indicating Genes and Melanopsin (Opn4)...mentioning

confidence: 99%

Effects of a variable light intensity lighting program on the welfare and performance of commercial broiler chickens

Kang¹,

Christensen

Kidd³

et al. 2023

Front. Physiol.

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Our previous variable-light intensity lighting program studies indicate the light intensity preference behavior of broilers for their daily activity including eating and resting. To evaluate the effects of variable-light intensity lighting program on performance and welfare of broilers, four commercial trials were conducted for looking at behaviors, mortality, leg-health, performance, and brain welfare indicator genes including tryptophan hydroxylase 2 and tyrosine hydroxylase (TH), glucocorticoid receptor (GR), brain-derived neurotropic factor (BDNF), and melanopsin (Opn4) gene expression. One-day-old broilers were housed in four commercial broiler houses. Each quadrant (section) of the house was placed with 4,800 chicks. A total of four lighting programs began on day 7 with 5 lux (lx), 20 lx, natural light (NL, 480 lx), and variable light (2–5/40 lx) using LED lights on a 16L:8D photoperiod. In the variable-light house, the number of dustbathing holes was significantly higher than that in natural-light houses and 5-lx and 20-lx houses. Daily physical activities, footpad condition, fear response to novel objects, body weight, feed conversion ratio, and the number of leg-problem induced culled birds were affected by the variable-light intensity lighting program. Expression of tryptophan hydroxylase 2 in the DRN and VTA of variable-light treated birds was lower than that of 5-lx- and 20-lx-treated birds on day 42 (p < 0.05). Higher expression of VTA-TH in 5-lx-treated birds than that in 20-lx-, NL-, and variable-light-treated birds suggests the high stress-susceptibility of 5-lx treated birds. Lower VTA-GR expression in 20-lx- and variable-light-treated birds indicates lower stress than that in NL- and 5-lx-treated birds (p < 0.05). The VTA-BDNF expression of NL-treated birds was 2.5 fold higher than that of 5-lx-, 20-lx-, and variable-light-treated birds (p < 0.05), and variable-light-treated birds showed the lowest level of BDNF expression (p < 0.05), suggesting the chronic social defeat stress in NL-treated birds. The result of VTA-Opn4 expression on day 42 suggests the possible role of VTA-Opn4 in broiler welfare through central light perception. Taken together, the variable-light intensity lighting program increased volunteer natural behaviors and physical activity, which may improve footpad condition and leg health of birds, consequently. Performance data including the increased daily weight gain and the lowered feed conversion ratio and results of brain welfare indicator gene expression showed the beneficial effect of the variable-light intensity lighting program on the performance and welfare of commercial broilers.

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Early Life Stress Alters Expression of Glucocorticoid Stress Response Genes and Trophic Factor Transcripts in the Rodent Basal Ganglia

Cited by 6 publications

References 91 publications

Early life adversities affect expected value signaling in the adult brain

Early life adversities affect expected value signaling in the adult brain

Outcomes of early social experiences on glucocorticoid and endocannabinoid systems in the prefrontal cortex of male and female adolescent rats

Effects of a variable light intensity lighting program on the welfare and performance of commercial broiler chickens

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