Maternal depressive symptoms influence neurodevelopment in the offspring. Such effects may appear to be gender-dependent. The present study examined contributions of prenatal and postnatal maternal depressive symptoms to the volume and microstructure of the amygdala in 4.5-year-old boys and girls. Prenatal maternal depressive symptoms were measured using the Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale (EPDS) at 26 weeks of gestation. Postnatal maternal depression was assessed at 3 months using the EPDS and at 1, 2, 3 and 4.5 years using the Beck's Depression Inventory-II. Structural magnetic resonance imaging and diffusion tensor imaging were performed with 4.5-year-old children to extract the volume and fractional anisotropy (FA) values of the amygdala. Our results showed that greater prenatal maternal depressive symptoms were associated with larger right amygdala volume in girls, but not in boys. Increased postnatal maternal depressive symptoms were associated with higher right amygdala FA in the overall sample and girls, but not in boys. These results support the role of variation in right amygdala structure in transmission of maternal depression to the offspring, particularly to girls. The differential effects of prenatal and postnatal maternal depressive symptoms on the volume and FA of the right amygdala suggest the importance of the timing of exposure to maternal depressive symptoms in brain development of girls. This further underscores the need for intervention targeting both prenatal and postnatal maternal depression to girls in preventing adverse child outcomes.

Most individuals identified as ultra-high-risk (UHR) for psychosis do not develop frank psychosis. They continue to exhibit subthreshold symptoms, or go on to fully remit. Prior work has shown that the volume of CA1, a subfield of the hippocampus, is selectively reduced in the early stages of schizophrenia. Here we aimed to determine whether patterns of volume change of CA1 are different in UHR individuals who do or do not achieve symptomatic remission. Structural MRI scans were acquired at baseline and at 1–2 follow-up time points (at 12-month intervals) from 147 UHR and healthy control subjects. An automated method (based on an ex vivo atlas of ultra-high-resolution hippocampal tissue) was used to delineate the hippocampal subfields. Over time, a greater decline in bilateral CA1 subfield volumes was found in the subgroup of UHR subjects whose subthreshold symptoms persisted (n=40) and also those who developed clinical psychosis (n=12), compared with UHR subjects who remitted (n=41) and healthy controls (n=54). No baseline differences in volumes of the overall hippocampus or its subfields were found among the groups. Moreover, the rate of volume decline of CA1, but not of other hippocampal subfields, in the non-remitters was associated with increasing symptom severity over time. Thus, these findings indicate that there is deterioration of CA1 volume in persistently symptomatic UHR individuals in proportion to symptomatic progression.

There is cumulative evidence that young people in an "atrisk mental state" (ARMS) for psychosis show structural brain abnormalities in frontolimbic areas, comparable to, but less extensive than those reported in established schizophrenia. However, most available data come from ARMS samples from Australia, Europe, and North America while large studies from other populations are missing. We conducted a structural brain magnetic resonance imaging study from a relatively large sample of 69 ARMS individuals and 32 matched healthy controls (HC) recruited from Singapore as part of the Longitudinal Youth At-Risk Study (LYRIKS). We used 2 complementary approaches: a voxel-based morphometry and a surface-based morphometry analysis to extract regional gray and white matter volumes (GMV and WMV) and cortical thickness (CT). At the whole-brain level, we did not find any statistically significant difference between ARMS and HC groups concerning total GMV and WMV or regional GMV, WMV, and CT. The additional comparison of 2 regions of interest, hippocampal, and ventricular volumes, did not return any significant difference either. Several characteristics of the LYRIKS sample like Asian origins or the absence of current illicit drug use could explain, alone or in conjunction, the negative findings and suggest that there may be no dramatic volumetric or CT abnormalities in ARMS.