| Abstract No.: | B-G2189 |
| Country: | Canada |
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| Title: | THE IMPACT OF EARLY IMMUNE CHALLENGE ON THE EMERGENCE OF ANXIETY-LIKE BEHAVIOURS |
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| Authors/Affiliations: | 1 Michelle Sidor*; 1 Glenda MacQueen; 1 Jane Foster;
1 McMaster University & the Brain-Body Institute, St. Joseph's Healthcare, Hamilton, ON, Canada;
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| Content: | Understanding how early life experience contributes to individual differences in vulnerability to psychiatric illness is a leading topic in clinical and behavioural neuroscience. An expanding body of literature provides evidence that exposure to environmental challenges during specific developmental time windows are critical to the development of stress-reactivity and related behaviours. For instance, immune challenge during the first postnatal week in rodents leads to long-term alterations in anxiety-related behaviours and stress-reactivity. Work in our lab has found that early immune challenge (lipopolysaccharide-LPS) resulted in increased activity in response to swim stress in adult LPS mice, and we suggest that this behaviour is a feature of the anxiety-like phenotype of LPS-mice. Objective: Since anxiety-like behaviours emerge early in life, this study examined the impact of early LPS challenge on exploratory and anxiety-like behaviour in the first 4 weeks of life. Methods: CD1 mice were challenged with LPS (0.05 mg/kg) i.p. or saline in a volume of 5 ml per g on postnatal days 3 and 5. Postnatal growth and development were monitored by weight and eye opening. Behavioural assessment included locomotor activity (P14), the light/dark test (P21), and the novelty-suppressed feeding test (P28). Results: Behavioural testing is currently underway. Preliminary results show that alterations in locomotor activity are already present in LPS-mice at an early stage in development. Conclusion: This study will offer insight into the developmental trajectory of anxiety-related behaviours. |
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