Roles for neurotransmitters in development: possible interaction with drugs during the fetal and neonatal periods.

In conclusion, a variety of experimental evidence suggests roles for serotonin and the catecholamine neurotransmitters in key phases of nervous system development, such as neural-tube formation, proliferation of neuronal precursor cells, and gliogenesis. This raises the possibility that psychoactive drugs of use and abuse which act via these neurotransmitters could, if taken by a woman at an appropriate stage of pregnancy, influence the developing embryonic nervous system by interfering with the synthesis, uptake, or metabolism of these compounds during critical periods of neural ontogeny.