| First Author | Chen Y | Year | 2022 |
| Journal | iScience | Volume | 25 |
| Issue | 7 | Pages | 104609 |
| PubMed ID | 35789832 | Mgi Jnum | J:326599 |
| Mgi Id | MGI:7313927 | Doi | 10.1016/j.isci.2022.104609 |
| Citation | Chen Y, et al. (2022) Corticosterone antagonist or TrkB agonist attenuates schizophrenia-like behavior in a mouse model combining Bdnf-e6 deficiency and developmental stress. iScience 25(7):104609 |
| abstractText | While schizophrenia pathogenesis involves both genetic and environmental factors, their specific combinations remain ill-defined. Here we show that deficiency in promoter VI-driven BDNF expression, combined with early-life adversity, results in schizophrenia-like endo-phenotypes. Promoter VI mutant mice (Bdnf-e6 (-/-) ), when exposed to postnatal stress including hypoxia or social isolation, exhibited deficits in social interactions, spatial memory, and sensorimotor gating reflected by prepulse inhibition (PPI). Neither early-life stress nor Bdnf-e6 deficiency alone caused these abnormalities. Moreover, postnatal stress increased blood corticosterone levels of wild-type mice, and administration of corticosterone to Bdnf-e6(-/-) mice without early-life stress also resulted in PPI deficits and social dysfunction. Finally, the PPI deficits in postnatally stressed Bdnf-e6(-/-) mice were rescued by treatment with the corticosterone antagonist RU-486, or the BDNF mimetic TrkB agonistic antibody. Thus, we have identified a pair of genetic and environmental factors contributing to schizophrenia pathogenesis and providing a potential strategy for therapeutic interventions for schizophrenia. |
