Dong Erbo, Zhang Huaibo, Chu Alison, Pandey Subhash C
Department of Psychiatry, Center for Alcohol Research in Epigenetics, College of Medicine, Psychiatric Institute, University of Illinois, Chicago, IL, United States.
Jesse Brown VA Medical Center, Chicago, IL, United States.
Front Behav Neurosci. 2022 May 26;16:862390. doi: 10.3389/fnbeh.2022.862390. eCollection 2022.
Alcohol use disorder (AUD) is a complex and chronic relapsing brain disease, which is often co-morbid with psychiatric disorders such as anxiety and depression. AUD phenotypes differ in men and women. Although genetic factors play an important role in its pathophysiology, epidemiologic evidence suggests that during prenatal development, individuals are more vulnerable to the negative effects of environmental factors that may predispose them to AUD later in life. We explored the effects of prenatal stress on the development of AUD phenotypes as well as anxiety- and depression-like behaviors using rat model.
In this study, timed-pregnant Sprague Dawley dams were used. Dams in the control group were left undisturbed throughout gestation, whereas dams in stress groups were either subjected to protracted or acute restraint stress under bright light. At adulthood, the anxiety-like, ethanol drinking, and sucrose drinking behaviors were measured using the Light/Dark Box test and two-bottle free-choice procedure.
Compared to the control group, both the male and female offspring in the stress groups exhibited anxiety-like behavior and consumed significantly higher amounts of ethanol in which the acute stress group demonstrated the higher ethanol preference. Moreover, male but not female offspring from the stress groups had decreased sucrose preferences.
These findings suggest that protracted and acute prenatal stress in late pregnancy can induce in anxiety-, depressive-like behaviors, and excessive ethanol intake in adult offspring.
酒精使用障碍（AUD）是一种复杂的慢性复发性脑部疾病，常与焦虑和抑郁等精神疾病共病。AUD的表型在男性和女性中有所不同。尽管遗传因素在其病理生理学中起重要作用，但流行病学证据表明，在产前发育期间，个体更容易受到环境因素的负面影响，这些因素可能使他们在以后的生活中易患AUD。我们使用大鼠模型探讨了产前应激对AUD表型以及焦虑和抑郁样行为发展的影响。
在本研究中，使用了定时怀孕的斯普拉格-道利母鼠。对照组的母鼠在整个妊娠期不受干扰，而应激组的母鼠在强光下接受长时间或急性束缚应激。成年后，使用明暗箱试验和双瓶自由选择程序测量焦虑样、乙醇饮用和蔗糖饮用行为。
与对照组相比，应激组的雄性和雌性后代均表现出焦虑样行为，并且乙醇摄入量显著更高，其中急性应激组表现出更高的乙醇偏好。此外，应激组的雄性后代而非雌性后代蔗糖偏好降低。
这些发现表明，妊娠晚期的长期和急性产前应激可导致成年后代出现焦虑、抑郁样行为以及过量摄入乙醇。
