Within-litter variation in maternal care is a key contributor to individual differences in offspring behavior and monoamine neurochemistry in female Long-Evans rats.
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| Název: | Within-litter variation in maternal care is a key contributor to individual differences in offspring behavior and monoamine neurochemistry in female Long-Evans rats. |
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| Autoři: | Whitman QA; Department of Biological Sciences, University of Toronto Scarborough Campus, 1265 Military Trail, Toronto, ON, M1C 1A4, Canada; Department of Cell and Systems Biology, University of Toronto, 25 Harbord Street, Toronto, ON, M5S 3G5, Canada. Electronic address: quintin.whitman@mail.utoronto.ca., Mirzaei A; Department of Biological Sciences, University of Toronto Scarborough Campus, 1265 Military Trail, Toronto, ON, M1C 1A4, Canada. Electronic address: amirreza.mirzaei@mail.utoronto.ca., Lauby SC; Department of Biological Sciences, University of Toronto Scarborough Campus, 1265 Military Trail, Toronto, ON, M1C 1A4, Canada; Department of Cell and Systems Biology, University of Toronto, 25 Harbord Street, Toronto, ON, M5S 3G5, Canada. Electronic address: samantha.lauby@austin.utexas.edu., Chatterjee D; The Peter Gilgan Centre for Research and Learning, SickKids Hospital, 686 Bay Street, Toronto, ON, M5G 0A4, Canada., Fleming A; Department of Psychology, University of Toronto, 100 St. George Street, Toronto, ON, M5S 3G3, Canada. Electronic address: alison.fleming@utoronto.ca., McGowan PO; Department of Biological Sciences, University of Toronto Scarborough Campus, 1265 Military Trail, Toronto, ON, M1C 1A4, Canada; Department of Cell and Systems Biology, University of Toronto, 25 Harbord Street, Toronto, ON, M5S 3G5, Canada; Department of Physiology, University of Toronto, 1 King's College Circle, Toronto, ON, M5S 1A8, Canada. Electronic address: patrick.mcgowan@utoronto.ca. |
| Zdroj: | Hormones and behavior [Horm Behav] 2025 Nov; Vol. 176, pp. 105821. Date of Electronic Publication: 2025 Sep 25. |
| Způsob vydávání: | Journal Article |
| Jazyk: | English |
| Informace o časopise: | Publisher: Academic Press Country of Publication: United States NLM ID: 0217764 Publication Model: Print-Electronic Cited Medium: Internet ISSN: 1095-6867 (Electronic) Linking ISSN: 0018506X NLM ISO Abbreviation: Horm Behav Subsets: MEDLINE |
| Imprint Name(s): | Original Publication: New York, London, Academic Press. |
| Výrazy ze slovníku MeSH: | Maternal Behavior*/physiology , Behavior, Animal*/physiology , Biogenic Monoamines*/metabolism , Individuality* , Brain*/metabolism, Animals ; Female ; Rats, Long-Evans ; Rats ; Social Behavior ; Male ; Dopamine/metabolism ; Anxiety/metabolism ; Serotonin/metabolism |
| Abstrakt: | Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest To the authors' knowledge, there is no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have influenced the work reported in this paper. The care that a mother rat provides is essential for the ability of her pups to survive and thrive. Maternal care naturally varies between litters, including among animals with close genetic relatedness. There are also significant differences in behavior even among offspring reared together. Our lab and others have documented stable, naturally occurring individual differences in maternal care received by individual pups within the litter that persist throughout at least the first ten days of postnatal life. In this study, we hypothesized that within-litter variation in maternal care received constitutes a significant source of variation in offspring behavior and neurochemistry in Long-Evans rats. We analyzed measures related to maternal care behavior, offspring anxiety-like and social behaviors, and neurotransmitter levels in specific brain regions after the offspring became mothers themselves. For statistical modeling, we used the coefficient of variation (CV) to standardize and directly compare between- and within-litter variation across a range of behavioral and neurophysiological outcomes. Several variables analyzed showed greater within-litter CVs than between-litter CVs, especially for offspring behavior and levels of the monoamines dopamine, serotonin, and their primary metabolites DOPAC (3,4-dihydroxyphenylacetic acid) and 5-HIAA (5-hydroxyindoleacetic acid) in the nucleus accumbens, ventral tegmental area, medial preoptic area, hippocampus, and prefrontal cortex. Our findings suggest that within-litter variation in maternal care plays a prominent role in behavioral and physiological outcomes. This study provides a methodological advance by demonstrating that within-litter variability often exceeds between-litter variability across maternal, behavioral, and neurochemical domains, challenging a key assumption in experimental designs using littermate controls. (Copyright © 2025. Published by Elsevier Inc.) |
| Contributed Indexing: | Keywords: Anxiety-like behavior; Between-litter; Coefficient of variation; Dopamine; Licking and grooming; Maternal care; Serotonin; Social behavior; Within-litter |
| Substance Nomenclature: | 0 (Biogenic Monoamines) VTD58H1Z2X (Dopamine) 333DO1RDJY (Serotonin) |
| Entry Date(s): | Date Created: 20250926 Date Completed: 20251119 Latest Revision: 20251119 |
| Update Code: | 20251121 |
| DOI: | 10.1016/j.yhbeh.2025.105821 |
| PMID: | 41004891 |
| Databáze: | MEDLINE |
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Nájsť tento článok vo Web of Science | Abstrakt: | Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest To the authors' knowledge, there is no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have influenced the work reported in this paper.<br />The care that a mother rat provides is essential for the ability of her pups to survive and thrive. Maternal care naturally varies between litters, including among animals with close genetic relatedness. There are also significant differences in behavior even among offspring reared together. Our lab and others have documented stable, naturally occurring individual differences in maternal care received by individual pups within the litter that persist throughout at least the first ten days of postnatal life. In this study, we hypothesized that within-litter variation in maternal care received constitutes a significant source of variation in offspring behavior and neurochemistry in Long-Evans rats. We analyzed measures related to maternal care behavior, offspring anxiety-like and social behaviors, and neurotransmitter levels in specific brain regions after the offspring became mothers themselves. For statistical modeling, we used the coefficient of variation (CV) to standardize and directly compare between- and within-litter variation across a range of behavioral and neurophysiological outcomes. Several variables analyzed showed greater within-litter CVs than between-litter CVs, especially for offspring behavior and levels of the monoamines dopamine, serotonin, and their primary metabolites DOPAC (3,4-dihydroxyphenylacetic acid) and 5-HIAA (5-hydroxyindoleacetic acid) in the nucleus accumbens, ventral tegmental area, medial preoptic area, hippocampus, and prefrontal cortex. Our findings suggest that within-litter variation in maternal care plays a prominent role in behavioral and physiological outcomes. This study provides a methodological advance by demonstrating that within-litter variability often exceeds between-litter variability across maternal, behavioral, and neurochemical domains, challenging a key assumption in experimental designs using littermate controls.<br /> (Copyright © 2025. Published by Elsevier Inc.) |
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| ISSN: | 1095-6867 |
| DOI: | 10.1016/j.yhbeh.2025.105821 |