Prenatal fluoxetine exposure in rats leads to detrimental behavioral outcomes in later life, which may partly be due to altered 5-HT(1A) receptor signaling.

A comparative study was performed to evaluate the differences in behavioral and physiological stress responses during milking between cows that were milked by an automated milking system (AM-cows) and cows that were milked in a conventional tandem parlor (TM-cows). In a randomized design, 36 primiparous Holstein-Friesian dairy cows were observed and blood sampled (1-min intervals) individually during milking. AM-cows spent less time standing with their heads outside the feeding trough than TM-cows and had a lower heart rate. In addition, AM-cows had lower maximum plasma adrenaline and noradrenaline concentrations during milking. No differences were found in the number of steps. After tactile stimulation of the teats either by hand or by the cleaning brush, mean oxytocin concentrations did not differ. In AM-cows, however, elevated oxytocin levels were prolonged at the end of milking. Averaged over the first five blood samples, AM-cows tended to have higher plasma cortisol concentrations than TM-cows, but median fecal concentrations of the cortisol metabolite dioxoandrostane were comparable. Maximum quarter milk flow, maximum udder milk flow and residual milk as a percentage of the total milk volume was comparable. From this study it is concluded that behavioral and physiological responses, both in automatically and in conventionally milked cows, were relatively low and were typical for cows being milked. We therefore conclude that, as far as the welfare of the dairy cow during milking is concerned, automatic milking and conventional milking are equally acceptable.

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The selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor (SSRI) Prozac® (fluoxetine) is the only registered antidepressant to treat depression in children and adolescents. Yet, while the safety of SSRIs has been well established in adults, serotonin exerts neurotrophic actions in the developing brain and thereby may have harmful effects in adolescents. Here we treated adolescent and adult rats chronically with fluoxetine (12 mg/kg) at postnatal day (PND) 25 to 46 and from PND 67 to 88, respectively, and tested the animals 7–14 days after the last injection when (nor)fluoxetine in blood plasma had been washed out, as determined by HPLC. Plasma (nor)fluoxetine levels were also measured 5 hrs after the last fluoxetine injection, and matched clinical levels. Adolescent rats displayed increased behavioral despair in the forced swim test, which was not seen in adult fluoxetine treated rats. In addition, beneficial effects of fluoxetine on wakefulness as measured by electroencephalography in adults was not seen in adolescent rats, and age-dependent effects on the acoustic startle response and prepulse inhibition were observed. On the other hand, adolescent rats showed resilience to the anorexic effects of fluoxetine. Exploratory behavior in the open field test was not affected by fluoxetine treatment, but anxiety levels in the elevated plus maze test were increased in both adolescent and adult fluoxetine treated rats. Finally, in the amygdala, but not the dorsal raphe nucleus and medial prefrontal cortex, the number of PSA-NCAM (marker for synaptic remodeling) immunoreactive neurons was increased in adolescent rats, and decreased in adult rats, as a consequence of chronic fluoxetine treatment. No fluoxetine-induced changes in 5-HT1A receptor immunoreactivity were observed. In conclusion, we show that fluoxetine exerts both harmful and beneficial age-dependent effects on depressive behavior, body weight and wakefulness, which may relate, in part, to differential fluoxetine-induced neuroplasticity in the amygdala.