Re: Mother's immune response and schizophrenia/autism in her offspring


Peter Ashby wrote:
Lance <LanceGary@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

ACTIVATING THE MATERNAL IMMUNE SYSTEM CAUSES CHANGES IN THE
OFFSPRING RESEMBLING THOSE IN SCHIZOPHRENIA AND AUTISM

Patterson P.H. California Institute of Technology.

Maternal viral infection is associated with increased risk of
schizophrenia and autism in the offspring. In a mouse model
based on this risk factor, we found that respiratory infection
with influenza virus leads to behavioral abnormalities in the
adult offspring. These behaviors are consistent with
abnormalities seen in schizophrenia and autism, including
enhanced anxiety in the open field (OF), as well as deficits in
social interaction (SI), latent inhibition (LI) and prepulse
inhibition (PPI). The latter is corrected by anti-psychotic and
exacerbated by psychomimetic drugs. The adult offspring display
neuropathology in the cortex and hippocampus similar to that
found in schizophrenia and a localized deficit in Purkinje
cells that resembles that in autism.

The cause of these various abnormalities is the maternal
response to viral infection, as treatment of uninfected,
pregnant mice with the dsRNA, poly(I:C), which evokes an
anti-viral-like immune response, also induces OF, SI, PPI and
LI deficits and the Purkinje cell deficit in the offspring.
Exploring potential mediators of these effects revealed that
injection of the cytokine IL-6 in normal pregnant mice causes
PPI and LI deficits in the offspring, while co-injection of
anti-IL-6 antibody with poly(I:C) in pregnant mice blocks the
effects of maternal immune activation on the behavior of the
offspring. Moreover, the offspring of poly(I:C) treated IL-6
knockout mice do not display behavioral abnormalities.
Furthermore, maternal anti-IL-6 blocks the changes in gene
expression in the brains of adult offspring that are caused by
maternal poly(I:C) treatment. Therefore, IL-6 is a key mediator
of the effects of the activated maternal immune response on
fetal brain development. Supported by the NIMH, and the
McKnight, Autism Speaks, and Cure Autism Now foundations.

(http://www.ibro2007.org/abstracts/edited/PATTERSON-20070315024132.rtf)

Fascinating, I wonder how that might correlate with the epidemiology
that shows the more grandfather's you have who are engineers/scientists
the more your risk of autism is. I suspect there will turn out to be
more than one route to autism, it is after all a spectrum disorder. Not
to mention that rodent engineers are not common...

BTW both my grandfathers were Engineers, as was my Father. Fortunately
this seems to have resulted mainly in my becoming a scientist ;-)

Peter
--
Add my middle initial to email me. It has become attached to a country
www.the-brights.net

Or like cancer autism could be a name for multiple conditions.

Lance

.

Relevant Pages
Loading