CIHR grant allows researchers to dig deeper into the effects of prenatal stress

caroline.zentner — Fri, 19 Aug 2016 16:21:43 +0000

Dr. Gerlinde Metz, a ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge neuroscientist, and her team of researchers have received more than $1.1 million in funding from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) to conduct further research into prenatal stress and examine the role of fathers’ stress in preterm birth and newborn development.

Research evidence suggests prenatal stress is linked to adverse pregnancy outcomes, such as preterm birth, and that the negative consequences from prenatal stress can be passed from one generation to another.

Dr. Gerlinde Metz, at left, works with a student in the lab at the Canadian Centre for Behavioural Neuroscience. The CIHR funding will allow the research team to further study the effects of prenatal stress.

“This research funding will help us get closer to answers about the effects of prenatal stress and identify treatments that can improve and even reverse preterm birth risk,” says Metz. “About 15 million preterm babies are born every year and they can face increased health risks throughout their lives. This is a significant issue around the world.”

Metz, along with Dr. Igor Kovalchuk, a U of L biology professor, and Dr. David Olson, an obstetrics and gynecology, pediatrics and physiology professor at the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Alberta, will take a neuroscience approach and use three separate rat models of prenatal stress. They’ll study the effects of generational stress on offspring when only fathers are stressed, when only mothers are stressed, and when both mothers and fathers are stressed.

“We will identify mechanisms involved in how the brain translates stress to alter pregnancy health and identify markers of prenatal stress that translate to future human studies of risk assessment,” says Metz.

The researchers will also study the mitigating effects of enriched environments and drug treatments. Previous research has shown that enriched environments have reduced stress responses. The researchers hypothesize that the use of enriched environments will reverse stress markers, normalize pregnancy outcomes and lessen the negative behavioural and developmental outcomes.

“Our goal is to develop new treatments that promote healthy futures for our children and next generations,” says Metz.

Researchers show prenatal stress influences new behavioural traits, including handedness

caroline.zentner — Tue, 26 Apr 2016 17:41:22 +0000

A new study by researchers at the Canadian Centre for Behavioural Neuroscience at the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge, recently published in Cerebral Cortex, shows the effects of prenatal stress accumulate across generations and can affect behavioural traits, such as right- and left-handedness.

Mirela Ambeskovic, a PhD candidate working in the laboratory of Dr. Gerlinde Metz, was the lead author in a study that examined the effects of prenatal stress over four generations of rats.

Mirela Ambeskovic

“Our original idea was just to test the effects of prenatal stress on motor development to see if it affects males and females differently and whether one generation of stress would have a different effect than four generations of stress,” says Ambeskovic. “But while I was testing my animals’ fine motor skills in a reaching task, I noticed something interesting.”

Ambeskovic found that males who were in the multigenerational stress group were predominantly left-pawed, while females in the same group were both left- and right-pawed. In comparison, males whose ancestors were only exposed to stress once, either in their mothers or their great-great-grandmothers, did not show a significant increase in being left-pawed.

She and Metz, a neuroscience professor, went through previous research and found no conclusive evidence of a genetic link to handedness.

“We thought maybe it’s an epigenetic effect because these animals have been stressed and epigenetically programmed across generations,” says Ambeskovic. “We did see a difference in behaviour so the stress had negative effects on fine motor skills in males and it actually had positive effects in females. Our females were better at the reaching task than the control group which had experienced no stress.”

With the help of Dr. Bryan Kolb, also a neuroscience professor, they examined the neural structure of the brains of these male rats. The researchers found their right hemispheres — which are linked to the left paw — showed increased complexity and spine density, or more connections, in their neurons.

Dr. Gerlinde Metz

“Ancestral stress often affects males more than females,” says Ambeskovic. “It affects their behaviour and it also changes their brain organization, so we see the structural changes in the neurons and their spine density.”

Researchers don’t know what comes first, paw preference or a dominant right brain hemisphere but even so, such changes should be adaptive. Ambeskovic says ancestral stress may have a protective effect for females.

“It could be that, through epigenetics, our moms prepare us for a stressful environment that might be coming down the road and it’s more important for females to know how to cope with it as they will be the bearers of the future generation,” says Ambeskovic.

In the same way, males affected by ancestral stress might be better prepared to defend their territory because they are more adaptable, perhaps because they could be more prone to using both paws if needed, Metz adds.

“There have been studies, that for programming across generations, there’s an increase in behavioural flexibility, especially in the males. That’s what we’re seeing here. There’s more flexibility to do more tasks,” says Metz.

Ambeskovic is also looking at the effects of multigenerational stress and aging. She has found that males exposed to multigenerational stress are more susceptible to chronic diseases as they age. This study, and others, show the brain can be changed by experience and this could help pave the way to developing interventions that could change the brain in beneficial ways earlier in life.

UNews - prenatal stress

CIHR grant allows researchers to dig deeper into the effects of prenatal stress

Related Topics

Researchers show prenatal stress influences new behavioural traits, including handedness

Related Topics