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Impacts of Early Life Stress on Adult Emotive Behavior and the PFC-Amygdala Circuit
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Alarcon, Juan Marcos
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Fall 2023
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2023-12-14
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Cote Thesis dissertation.pdf
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Abstract
Fear responses in mammals are ancient and adaptive responses. Specialized neural systems
have evolved to support adaptive responses, and these have critical developmental time points.
Disrupting development of these systems with environmental stress impacts mood and
conduct, and as adults, stressed individuals demonstrate depressive or anxiety -like behavior.
This project investigates impacts of early life stress (ELS) on behavior and the synaptic
physiology of the basolateral amygdala and prelimbic (PL) and infralimbic (IL) areas of the
prefrontal cortex (PFC) in rodents. C57/BL6 male and female mouse pups were subjected to
maternal separation (with concurrent maternal stress) and isolation during the critical
neurodevelopmental period of postnatal day 10 to 17 (PND10-17) and then housed normally
until adulthood (ELS group). Another cohort of male and female mice grew under normal
conditions but underwent forced swim stress in adulthood (Adult stress group). Both groups of
animals plus a home-cage control group (male and female) were assessed with a battery of
tests to measure depressive and anxiety- like behaviors, and subsequently sacrificed for
electrophysiological experiments. Behavioral analyses show ELS mice exhibited phenotypes
consistent with depressive and anxiety- like behaviors that appear to match those observed in
adult stressed mice. Analysis for sex differences revealed performance-specific differences
between groups. Electrophysiological analyses indicate ELS mice show increased postsynaptic
excitability in the basolateral amygdala and increased presynaptic drive in PL and IL PFC
compared with control animals, as well as sex differences. Our findings indicate that ELS causes
behavioral disruptions and dysregulation of synaptic function in amygdala and PFC that lasts
into adulthood.
Citation
Cote, E (2023). Impacts of Early Life Stress on Adult Emotive Behavior and the PFC-Amygdala Circuit. [Doctoral dissertation, SUNY Downstate Health Sciences University]. SUNY Open Access Repository. https://soar.suny.edu/handle/20.500.12648/14756