Project Summary

Lotta Arborelius, Ph.D. (Independent Investigator 2002) of Karolinska Institute, is studying whether early-life stress produces changes in serotonergic neurons in the brain.  Evidence suggests that stress, particularly early in life, is an individual vulnerability factor for development of depression in adulthood.  The maternal deprivation model is a model often used to study early-life stress and the development of a depression-like syndrome in rats.  In this model, rat pups are separated daily from their mother during three hours from the age of two to 14 days.  Control rats are separated from their mother for only 15 minutes each day during the same period.  By studying the effects of different drugs that affect serotonin neurons in different ways, she can study if these neurons have been affected by early-life stress.  The effects of such drugs will be studied on the electrical activity of individual serotonergic neurons and on serotonin release in specific regions in the brain.  In addition, the basal levels of serotonin in specific brain regions will be analyzed.  Dr. Aborelius' previous findings suggest that stress early in life gives rise to persistent changes in serotonergic neurons in the brain.  These findings are very interesting since it has been suggested that serotonergic neurons in the brain are dysfunctional in human depression.  Thus, it is possible that early-life stress gives rise to persistent changes in neurons in the brain, which may contribute to late development of depression.  The goal of her research is to find exactly what changes occur in the brain in response to early-life stress, especially in the serotonergic neurons.  Hopefully, this study will lead to the development of better drugs for treatement of depression, i.e., drugs that are faster acting, have increased efficacy and with fewer side-effects.

Program Area: MOOD DISORDERS\Depression (Unipolar)\Pharmacology

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