S24. JUVENILITY AND ADOLESCENCE ARE CRITICAL PERIODS OF VULNERABILITY TO PSYCHOTOGENIC EFFECT OF STRESS: RELEVANCE TO SCHIZOPHRENIA

摘要

Our prior work on the methylazoxymethanol acetate (MAM) developmental model of schizophrenia showed that MAM-treated offspring during prepuberty have increased anxiety, hyper-responsivity to stress, and hyperactivity in the amygdala, prior to dopamine dysregulation. Furthermore, treating anxiety prepubertally prevented the emergence of hyperdopaminergic state in adulthood. These data suggest that early developmental disruption (genetic or environmental) might render individuals more susceptible to stress during critical time windows, during which unregulated stress can lead to the emergence of psychosis later in life. If this is true, one can further hypothesize that 1) sufficiently intense stress during vulnerable periods can lead to a similar hyperdopaminergic state in normal rats, and 2) reducing stress prepubertally can potentially prevent the manifestation of hyperdopaminergia in MAM rats.