Prenatal Programming of the Mesolimbic Reward Pathway and Food Preferences
The drive to consume palatable foods, high in fat and sugar, goes beyond the need to satisfy hunger and has a strong hedonic component. Studies in rodent models have demonstrated that the preference for these foods can be programmed before birth, and that feeding dams on cafeteria diets during pregnancy and lactation is associated with an increased preference for palatable foods in the offspring after weaning. More recently, attention has turned towards elucidating the biological mechanisms which drive these effects, with studies to date focussing on the impact of maternal cafeteria diets on the development of the mesolimb...
Source: Springer protocols feed by Neuroscience - November 9, 2015 Category: Neuroscience Source Type: news

Studies on the Effects Prenatal Immune Activation on Postnatal Behavior: Models of Developmental Origins of Schizophrenia
Human epidemiological studies have indicated an association between infection during pregnancy and an increased risk of neurodevelopmental disorders such as schizophrenia in offspring. As infections arising from various causes have a similar debilitating effect in later life, it is thought that the maternal response, common to most infections, may be the critical factor altering fetal brain development. In this chapter, we discuss various animal models of prenatal exposure to an infection, that have aimed to cause neurobiological, pharmacological and behavioral abnormalities in offspring comparable to those seen in schizop...
Source: Springer protocols feed by Neuroscience - November 9, 2015 Category: Neuroscience Source Type: news

Placental Transport and Metabolism: Implications for the Developmental Effects of Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitors (SSRI) Antidepressants
A host of neurodevelopmental processes are modulated by serotonin (5-HT), a molecule also implicated in the etiology of diverse psychiatric disorders. Prenatal exposures that affect serotonergic signaling and the developing 5-HT system are increasingly associated with multiple long-term repercussions for the offspring. Both maternal depression and antidepressant treatments have been shown to affect fetal neurodevelopment during pregnancy, possibly through alterations of 5-HT levels that are otherwise precisely set by placental and endogenous sources. The result of such dysregulation impacts a variety of critical signaling ...
Source: Springer protocols feed by Neuroscience - November 9, 2015 Category: Neuroscience Source Type: news

Models of Perinatal Compromises in the Guinea Pig: Their Use in Showing the Role of Neurosteroids in Pregnancy and the Newborn
Placental progesterone production during late gestation has a major role in maintaining elevated neurosteroid levels during pregnancy. These levels of key neurosteroids, including allopregnanolone, are critical for optimal brain development during late gestation and the early neonatal period. The long gestation period (~70), in utero brain development and placental progesterone synthesis of the guineas pig makes this species very suitable for studying the mechanisms by which pregnancy compromises impact neurosteroid pathways. We have used models of intrauterine growth restriction and preterm birth to show that these challe...
Source: Springer protocols feed by Neuroscience - November 9, 2015 Category: Neuroscience Source Type: news

Maternal Obesity in Pregnancy: Consequences for Brain Function in the Offspring
It is perhaps not surprising that an inhospitable intrauterine environment can result in neurodevelopmental disorders, given the enormous changes in brain development that occur during gestation. Here we discuss: (1) Obesity is a state of low-grade inflammation and is thus a candidate for having an unfavorable impact on brain function in the offspring. (2) Maternal obesity has recently been associated with offspring attention deficit hyperactivity disorder and autism spectrum disorder. A recent study found differences in amniotic fluid mRNA for 20 genes in fetuses of obese versus lean women, and several of these genes impa...
Source: Springer protocols feed by Neuroscience - November 9, 2015 Category: Neuroscience Source Type: news

Circadian Rhythms in the Fetus and Newborn: Significance of Interactions with Maternal Physiology and the Environment
Timing of balanced and precise daily delivery of oxygen, nutrients, hormones, and biophysical cues from mother to fetus is essential for fetal growth and successful transition to extrauterine life. Such timing is provided by an arrangement of biological clocks operating in the mother and fetus. However, adverse intrauterine conditions including effects of altering the photoperiod (chronodisruption) during gestation on fetal growth/development and postnatal physiology may translate into adult disease, in which the role played by fetal circadian system remains unclear. Here we review the development of the circadian system, ...
Source: Springer protocols feed by Neuroscience - November 9, 2015 Category: Neuroscience Source Type: news

Fetal Sleep and Spontaneous Behavior In Utero: Animal and Clinical Studies
The term fetal behavior includes fetal sleep states, which in precocial mammalian species (i.e., those born relatively mature at birth) develop in late gestation, along with the fetal physiological processes, such as fetal body movements and breathing activity, cardiovascular function, blood gas, and acid-base status, which are linked to fetal sleep states. Since ~1970, as a result of technological and technical advances, there has been significant advances in our understanding of fetal behavior in man and animals, and also the development of fetal monitoring techniques in human pregnancy that are based on the changes in f...
Source: Springer protocols feed by Neuroscience - November 9, 2015 Category: Neuroscience Source Type: news

Cerebral Blood Flow Measurements in the Neonatal Brain
Cerebrovascular lesions and hypoxic-ischaemic brain injury are important causes of acquired neonatal brain injury in term and preterm newborn infants, which lead to significant morbidity and long-term mortality. Improved understanding of the cerebral hemodynamics and metabolism in the immature brain, and blood flow responses to physiological and external stimuli would aid understanding of the pathogenesis of neonatal brain injury. There has been increasing research interest and clinical demand to study the neonatal brain, with the exploration of the bedside and real-time measurement of cerebral hemodynamics in guiding ther...
Source: Springer protocols feed by Neuroscience - November 9, 2015 Category: Neuroscience Source Type: news

Advanced EEG and MRI Measurements to Study the Functional Development of the Newborn Brain
In this chapter we review the methodological progress that has recently been made for studying brain development in infants using noninvasive techniques. In particular, we focus on methodological platforms based on electroencephalography (EEG) and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). Key aspects of experimental setup, data acquisition, data preprocessing, and analysis are described and discussed with emphasis on recordings performed on the infant brain. The measurement and estimation of large-scale brain network connectivity using fMRI and EEG has become an important tool to study brain development. To this end, w...
Source: Springer protocols feed by Neuroscience - November 9, 2015 Category: Neuroscience Source Type: news

Isolation of GABAergic Cortical Neurons and Implications for Cell Transplantation Strategies in the Nervous System
The correct layer placement of interneurons and pyramidal neurons during corticogenesis is required for precise neuronal activity and subsequent functions of the neocortex. Interneurons are generated in the medial ganglionic eminence (MGE) and migrate from the ventral to dorsal telencephalon to reside within the developing cortical plate. Transplantation strategies are valuable in understanding the cellular and molecular basis of interneuron development, and more recently in the potential for cell-based therapies of neurological disorders. With the advancement of transgenic technologies, interneurons can be fluorescently l...
Source: Springer protocols feed by Neuroscience - November 9, 2015 Category: Neuroscience Source Type: news

In Utero Electroporation Methods in the Study of Cerebral Cortical Development
Research in the field of cortical development has benefited from technical advances in recent years, and tools are now available to label, monitor, and modulate cohorts of cerebral cortical neurons using in vivo approaches. Substantial populations of cerebral cortical neurons are generated in a specific sequence by the radial glia progenitors that line the ventricular surface during development. These radial progenitors self-renew and generate intermediate progenitors or neurons in a precisely choreographed fashion. Electroporation or electropermeabilization is a method that uses electric pulses to deliver molecules into c...
Source: Springer protocols feed by Neuroscience - November 9, 2015 Category: Neuroscience Source Type: news

Investigating Early Formation of the Cerebral Cortex by In Utero Electroporation: Methods and Protocols
Cortical development requires a strict balance between neuronal proliferation, differentiation, and cellular migration within restricted developmental stages. The precise spatiotemporal gene manipulation used in developmental studies can be achieved by in vitro or ex vivo experiments or by the generation of transgenic animals. However, these approaches have significant limitations when trying to investigate the origin and molecular regulation of early cortical neurons. In utero electroporation (IUE) is an informative cell labeling technique that provides the ability to label neural progenitor cells and their progeny in viv...
Source: Springer protocols feed by Neuroscience - November 9, 2015 Category: Neuroscience Source Type: news

The Rabbit as a Model of Cerebral Palsy
Rabbits, like humans, are perinatal brain developers. We have developed a model of fetal hypoxia-ischemia that results in postnatal rabbit kits with a phenotype analogous to that observed in humans with cerebral palsy. This chapter gives a practical approach to performing the model and shows the range methods available for study using the model. (Source: Springer protocols feed by Neuroscience)
Source: Springer protocols feed by Neuroscience - September 21, 2015 Category: Neuroscience Source Type: news

The Sheep as a Model of Brain Injury in the Premature Infant
We describe a global cerebral ischemia preparation that replicates major features of acute and chronic human cerebral injury and which has provided access to complex clinically relevant studies of cerebral blood flow and neuro-imaging that are not feasible in smaller laboratory animals. Despite the higher costs and technical challenges of instrumented preterm fetal sheep models, they allow an integrated analysis of the spectrum of insults that appear to contribute to cerebral injury in human preterm infants. (Source: Springer protocols feed by Neuroscience)
Source: Springer protocols feed by Neuroscience - September 21, 2015 Category: Neuroscience Source Type: news

Studies of Perinatal Asphyxial Brain Injury in the Fetal Sheep
In order to develop more effective ways of identifying, managing, and treating perinatal asphyxial brain injury, stable experimental models are essential. Although the outcome of clinical asphyxia is highly variable, modern imaging studies have distinguished two major patterns of injury in term infants, involving primary damage in either the parasagittal cortex or in the basal ganglia respectively. The present review describes the experimental preparation in detail, and the key experimental factors that determine the pattern and severity of brain injury in chronically instrumented fetal sheep, including the depth (“s...
Source: Springer protocols feed by Neuroscience - September 21, 2015 Category: Neuroscience Source Type: news