Smoking during pregnancy: Postnatal effects on arousal and attentional brain systems

Abstract

Prenatal exposure to cigarette smoke is known to produce lasting arousal, attentional and cognitive deficits in humans. The pedunculopontine nucleus (PPN), as the cholinergic arm of the reticular activating system (RAS), is known to modulate arousal, waking and REM sleep. Rapid eye movement (REM) sleep decreases between 10 and 30 days postnatally in the rat, with the greatest decrease occurring at 12-21 days. Pregnant dams were exposed to 150 ml of cigarette smoke for 15 min, 3 times per day, from day E14 until parturition, and the pups allowed to mature. We analyzed a) intrinsic membrane properties of PPN neurons in slices from pups aged 12-21 days, and b) the sleep state-dependent P13 auditory evoked potential, which is generated by PPN outputs, in animals allowed to age to adolescence. We found significant changes in the intrinsic membrane properties of PPN cells in prenatally exposed animals compared to intact ones, rendering these cells more excitable. In addition, we found disturbances in the habituation to repetitive stimulation in adolescent, freely moving animals, suggestive of a deficit in the process of sensory gating. These findings could explain some of the differences seen in individuals whose parents smoked during pregnancy, especially in terms of their hypervigilance and increased propensity for attentional deficits and cognitive/behavioral disorders.

Maternal Active and Passive Smoking and Hypertensive Disorders of Pregnancy

“…A similar concern has arisen in the literature linking prenatal smoking with childhood attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). Although maternal prenatal smoking has been consistently associated with increased risks of ADHD in offspring in a number of human 21,22 and animal 23,24 studies, the use of a sib-pair design to control for unmeasured confounding reduced the magnitude of the association dramatically. 25 Likewise, the CPP (conducted when smoking was far more prevalent during pregnancy) found no association between maternal smoking and ADHD.…”

Maternal nicotine exposure during lactation alters food preference, anxiety-like behavior and the brain dopaminergic reward system in the adult rat offspring

“…During pregnancy, human studies show that smoking can lead to prematurity, low birth weight, impaired child growth, higher infant mortality [32,51] and behavioral changes [68,76]. In rats, it has also been demonstrated an association between smoking pregnancy and behavioral disorders [45]. Smoking after birth has been shown to cause changes in the neurological development of the child [73].…”

Theory of Mind Development is Impaired in 4-Year-Old Children with Prenatal Exposure to Maternal Tobacco Smoking

“…In this paper we examine the effects of in utero exposure to tobacco through maternal smoking – the most common drug fetuses are exposed to in the United States. Given the impact of prenatal exposure to tobacco on social and cognitive development as demonstrated in studies examining behavioral problems (12-14), psychopathology (15;16), and neurocognitive deficits (17), we hypothesized that children of mothers who smoked during pregnancy would demonstrate deficits in ToM.…”