Children exposed to abuse or neglect show abnormal hippocampal development and similar findings have been reported in rodent models. Using brief daily separation (BDS), a mouse model of early life stress, we previously showed that exposure to BDS impairs hippocampal function in adulthood and perturbs synaptic maturation, synaptic pruning, axonal growth and myelination in the developing hippocampus. Given that microglia are involved in these developmental processes, we tested whether BDS impairs microglial activity in the hippocampus of 14 (during BDS) and 28-day old mice (one week after BDS). We found that BDS increased the density and altered the morphology of microglia in the hippocampus of 14-day old pups, effects that were no longer present on postnatal day (PND) 28. Despite the normal cell number and morphology seen at PND28, the molecular signature of hippocampal microglia, assessed using the NanoString immune panel, was altered at both ages. We showed that during normal hippocampal development, microglia undergo significant changes between PND14 and PND28, including reduced cell density, decreased ex vivo phagocytic activity, and an increase in the expression of genes involved in inflammation and cell migration. However, microglia harvested from the hippocampus of 28-day old BDS mice showed an increase in phagocytic activity and reduced expression of genes that normally increase across development. Promoter analysis indicated that alteration in the transcriptional activity of PU.1, Creb1, Sp1, and RelA accounted for most of the transcriptional changes seen during normal microglia development and for most of the BDS-induced changes at PND14 and PND28. These findings are the first to demonstrate that early life stress dysregulates microglial function in the developing hippocampus and to identify key transcription factors that are likely to mediate these changes.

Childhood maltreatment is associated with a wide range of psychopathologies including anxiety that emerge in childhood and in many cases persist in adulthood. Increased amygdala activation in response to threat and abnormal amygdala connectivity with frontolimbic brain regions, such as the hippocampus and the prefrontal cortex, are some of the most consistent findings seen in individuals exposed to childhood maltreatment. The underlying mechanisms responsible for these changes are difficult to study in humans but can be elucidated using animal models of early-life stress. Such studies are especially powerful in the mouse where precise control of the genetic background and the stress paradigm can be coupled with resting-state fMRI (rsfMRI) to map abnormal connectivity in circuits that regulate anxiety. To address this issue we first compared the effects of two models of early-life stress, limited bedding (LB) and unpredictable postnatal stress (UPS), on anxiety-like behavior in juvenile and adult mice. We found that UPS, but not LB, causes a robust increase in anxiety in juvenile and adult male mice. Next, we used rsfMRI to compare frontolimbic connectivity in control and UPS adult male mice. We found increased amygdala–prefrontal cortex and amygdala–hippocampus connectivity in UPS. The strength of the amygdala–hippocampal and amygdala–prefrontal cortex connectivity was highly correlated with anxiety-like behavior in the open-field test and elevated plus maze. These findings are the first to link hyperconnectivity in frontolimbic circuits and increased anxiety in a mouse model of early-life stress, allowing for more mechanistic understanding of parallel findings in humans.

A better understanding of the molecular and cellular mechanisms by which early life stress (ELS) modifies brain development and adult behavior is necessary for diagnosing and treating psychopathology associated with exposure to ELS. For historical reasons most of the work in rodents has been done in rats and attempts to establish robust and reproducible paradigms in the mouse have proven to be challenging. Here we show that under normal rearing conditions, increased levels of postnatal maternal care are associated with a decrease in anxiety-like behavior in BALB/cByj offspring. Brief daily pup-dam separation (BDS) during the postnatal period was associated with increased postnatal maternal care but was surprisingly associated with increased anxiety-like behavior in adult offspring, providing the first example in which offspring receiving higher levels of postnatal maternal care are more anxious in adulthood. Plasma corticosterone levels were elevated in BDS pups even three hours after the pups were reunited with the dam, suggesting that this paradigm represents a form of early life stress. We also show that levels of total RNA and DNA in the hippocampus reach a peak at postnatal day 14 and that exposure to BDS seems to inhibit this developmental growth spurt. We propose that exposure to stress during the postnatal period overrides the ability of high levels of postnatal maternal care to program anxiety-like behavior by inhibiting the normal growth spurt that characterizes this period.

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Childhood maltreatment represents a major risk factor for the development of numerous childhood psychopathologies that in many cases linger as chronic mental illnesses in adulthood. Exposing rodents or non-human primates to early life stress increases anxiety-like behaviors and impairs cognitive function in adulthood, suggesting that animal models may provide important insights into parallel developmental processes in humans. Using an unbiased genomic screen, we found that expression of lipopolysaccharide binding protein (LBP), a member of the innate immune system, is dramatically decreased in the hippocampus of pups exposed to early life stress. LBP levels peak in the normally developing hippocampus at a period of intense synaptic pruning, during which LBP is colocalized with the synaptic marker PSD95 and is found in close proximity to processes of microglia cells. Expression of LBP declines to low levels seen in adulthood at around postnatal day 30. Importantly, 30-day-old LBP knockout (k.o.) mice show increased spine density and abnormal spine morphology, suggesting that peak levels of LBP during the second and third weeks of life are necessary for normal synaptic pruning in the hippocampus. Finally, LBP k.o. mice show impaired hippocampal-dependent memory and increased anxiety-like behaviors in a manner that resembles that seen in animals exposed to early life stress. These findings describe a novel role for LBP in normal hippocampal development and raise the possibility that at least some of the behavioral sequelae of early life stress are mediated by reduced expression of LBP during a critical period of neurodevelopment.

Previous investigations on the expression and function of special AT-rich sequence binding protein 2 (Satb2) are largely limited to the cerebral cortex. Here, we explore the expression of Satb2 thoroughly by immunohistochemistry in the adult mouse central nervous system (CNS). Besides the cerebral cortex, we found that Satb2 is specifically expressed in the bed nucleus of the stria terminalis, horizontal limb of the diagonal band, lateral hypothalamic area, arcuate nucleus, hypothalamic paraventricular nucleus, ventral tegmental nucleus, laterodorsal tegmental nucleus, dorsal raphe nucleus, rostral periolivary region, and parabrachial nucleus. Double immunostaining showed that Satb2 is exclusively expressed in the excitatory neurons of neocortex. In addition, Satb2 is specifically expressed in A12 group of hypothalamic dopaminergic neurons and in serotonergic neurons in the dorsal part of the dorsal raphe nucleus. Our results present a comprehensive overview of Satb2 expression in the adult brain and provide insights for studying the role of Satb2 in the mature CNS. Anat Rec, 296:452-461,

Conflicting reports are available with regard to the effects of childhood abuse and neglect on hippocampal function in children. While earlier imaging studies and some animal work have suggested that the effects of early-life stress (ELS) manifest only in adulthood, more recent studies have documented impaired hippocampal function in maltreated children and adolescents. Additional work using animal modes is needed to clarify the effects of ELS on hippocampal development. In this regard, genomic, proteomic, and molecular tools uniquely available in the mouse make it a particularly attractive model system to study this issue. However, very little work has been done so far to characterize the effects of ELS on hippocampal development in the mouse. To address this issue, we examined the effects of brief daily separation (BDS), a mouse model of ELS that impairs hippocampal-dependent memory in adulthood, on hippocampal development in 28-day-old juvenile mice. This age was chosen because it corresponds to the developmental period in which human imaging studies have revealed abnormal hippocampal development in maltreated children. Exposure to BDS caused a significant decrease in the total protein content of synaptosomes harvested from the hippocampus of 28-day-old male and female mice, suggesting that BDS impairs normal synaptic development in the juvenile hippocampus. Using a novel liquid chromatography multiple reaction monitoring mass spectrometry (LC-MRM) assay, we found decreased expression of many synaptic proteins, as well as proteins involved in axonal growth, myelination, and mitochondrial activity. Golgi staining in 28-day-old BDS mice showed an increase in the number of immature and abnormally shaped spines and a decrease in the number of mature spines in CA1 neurons, consistent with defects in synaptic maturation and synaptic pruning at this age. In 14-day-old pups, BDS deceased the expression of proteins involved in axonal growth and myelination, but did not affect the total protein content of synaptosomes harvested from the hippocampus, or protein levels of other synaptic markers. These results add two important findings to previous work in the field. First, our findings demonstrate that in 28-day-old juvenile mice, BDS impairs synaptic maturation and reduces the expression of proteins that are necessary for axonal growth, myelination, and mitochondrial function. Second, the results suggest a sequential model in which BDS impairs normal axonal growth and myelination before it disrupts synaptic maturation in the juvenile hippocampus.

The capacity to interact with conspecifics is essential for stable social networks, reproduction, and survival in mammals. In rodents, social exploration and play behavior increase during the juvenile period suggesting that this timeframe represents an important window for socialization. However, the cellular and molecular mechanisms necessary to support this developmental process have not been elucidated. Neurogenesis during the juvenile period, like that in adults, is mainly confined to the subgranular and subventricular zones. Nevertheless, the levels of neurogenesis are significantly higher during the juvenile period suggesting unique functions not shared with adult neurogenesis. Here we use a transgenic mouse approach that allows for ablation of neurogenesis during different developmental phases. We find that ablating neurogenesis during either juvenile or adult phases altered anxiety and memory in adult female mice, demonstrating an age-independent function of new neurons for certain behaviors. Blocking neurogenesis during the juvenile period resulted in a profound impairment in the ability of these mice to interact with other adult females or to retrieve pups, without causing gross olfactory deficits. Interestingly, ablating neurogenesis in adult females had no effect on these social behaviors. This work defines a novel role for juvenile neurogenesis in establishing brain circuits necessary for socialization, and demonstrates that juvenile- and adult-neurogenesis make different contributions to social competency in adult female mice. Additional work is needed to determine whether ablation of juvenile neurogenesis in the subgranular zone and/or the subventricular zone is responsible for the social abnormalities seen after global elimination of juvenile neurogenesis.