The Utility of Ethological Assessments of Murine Agonistic Interactions in Behavioural Teratology: The Foetal Alcohol Syndrome

Animal models of fetal alcohol spectrum disorders: impact of the social environment

Animal models of fetal alcohol spectrum disorder (FASD) have been used to demonstrate the specificity of alcohol's teratogenic effects and some of the underlying changes in the central nervous system (CNS) and, more recently, to explore ways to ameliorate the effects of alcohol. The main point of this review is to highlight research findings from the animal literature which point to the impact of the social context or social behavior on the effect(s) of alcohol exposure during development, and also to point to research questions about the social environment and effects of prenatal alcohol exposure that remain to be answered. Alcohol exposure during early development alters maternal responding to the exposed pup in a variety of ways and the alteration in maternal responding could alter later stress responsivity and adult maternal and social behavior of the exposed offspring. Environmental enrichment and voluntary exercise have been shown to ameliorate some of alcohol's impact during development, but the roles of enhanced social interactions in the case of enrichment and of social housing during voluntary exercise need to be more fully delineated. Similarly, the role of social context across the lifespan, such as social housing, social experiences, and contact with siblings, needs further study. Because of findings that alcohol during development alters DNA methylation patterns and that there are alterations in the maternal care of the alcohol-exposed offspring, epigenetic effects and their relationship to social behavior in animal models of FASD are likely to become a fruitful area of research. Because of the simpler social behavior and the short lifespan of rodents, animal models of FASD can be useful in determining how the social context impacts the effects of alcohol exposure during development.

Nerve Growth Factor is Required for Induction of c-Fos Immunoreactivity by Serum, Depolarization, Cyclic AMP or Trauma in Cultured Rat Sympathetic Neurons

Nerve growth factor (NGF) induces transient Fos-immunoreactivity (Fos-IR) independently of any other factor, both in newly isolated rat sympathetic neurons and in established cultures after NGF deprivation. The same proportion of neurons that express Fos-IR in response to NGF also survive. In addition to direct stimulation of Fos-IR expression, the presence or recent exposure to NGF is required to obtain Fos-IR expression by other stimuli. In newly isolated neurons no Fos-IR is detected in response to stimulation by serum alone and a response to depolarization or cyclic AMP is obtained only if neurons are stimulated within a short period after ganglion excision. In established cultures none of these stimuli, nor the trauma of cutting neurites or spiking cell bodies with a microinjection needle induce Fos-IR unless NGF is present or had been removed for <8 - 16 h. The lack of response is not due to a general decrease in the rate of protein or RNA synthesis. These findings show that in regenerating sympathetic neurons NGF induces c-Fos and suggest that NGF may activate a master trigger that is required for c-Fos expression to be induced by other stimuli.

The effect of cyclic AMP on neuritic outgrowth in explant cultures of developing chick olfactory epithelium

The effect of cyclic AMP (cAMP) analogs and phosphodiesterase (PDE) inhibitors on neurite outgrowth was studied in explant cultures of olfactory neurons. Nasal pits from 5- or 6-day-old chick embryos were minced, explanted into culture dishes, and grown in a serum-free medium. One of the cyclic AMP analogs, dibutyryl cyclic AMP (dbcAMP) or 8-bromo-cyclic AMP (8-Br-cAMP), or one of the PDE inhibitors, theophylline or isobutylmethylxanthine (IBMX), was added to the culture medium. The explants were examined for neurite outgrowth after 2 days in vitro. Db-cAMP increased the number of explants expressing neurites by 25-35% over control cultures, whereas 8-Br-cAMP had essentially no effect at the same concentrations. Addition of dibutyryl cyclic GMP (dbcGMP) gave no increase in neurite outgrowth, thus indicating that the effect of enhancing neuritic growth is specific to cAMP and not cyclic nucleotides in general. The resulting increase in neurite outgrowth is due to the cyclic nucleotide component of dbcAMP, since both IBMX and theophylline, which elevate intracellular cAMP, also increased neurite outgrowth significantly. When forskolin was added to the culture medium, there was a trend to increased neurite outgrowth; this was significantly enhanced when a subthreshold concentration of theophylline was added in addition to the forskolin.