They study how stress during adolescence affects the thalamus

Scientists have investigated how stress during adolescence affects the thalamus, a brain region affected in psychiatric diseases such as depression or schizophrenia.

Scientists from the Mental Health Network Biomedical Research Center (CIBERSAM), the INCLIVA Health Research Institute, the Valencia University Clinical Hospital and the University of Valencia (UV), in Spain, all of these entities, have scientifically described how stress During adolescence, it modifies the behavior and circuits of the thalamus, a region of the brain that is essential for processing information that comes from outside and also participates in complex cognitive processes.

Juan Nácher, principal investigator of CIBERSAM, coordinator of the Psychiatry and Neurodegenerative Diseases Research Group of INCLIVA, professor of Cellular Biology at the UV and co-author of the study, explains that “the thalamus is a very interesting region because it has been seen to be affected. in various psychiatric diseases such as depression or schizophrenia and our own work with neuroimaging in patients shows that this is the case. “In the current study, we fundamentally analyze the inhibitory neural circuits that are fundamental for the control of the functioning of the thalamus and we demonstrate, using mice, that adverse experiences during adolescence have a very important impact on the thalamus, especially in females.”

In addition, the research team, which also includes Julia Alcaide and Yaiza Gramuntell, both from the University of Valencia, CIBERSAM and INCLIVA, is also exploring new diagnostic procedures that allow direct or indirect access to the brain of patients, both through neuroimaging analysis and through the study of genes and molecules in the blood, through olfactory epithelial cells that have many characteristics in common with neurons or through the generation of neuronal lines from blood cells.

From left to right: Juan Nácher, Julia Alcaide, Clara Bueno, Marta Pérez and Esther Castillo. (Photo: INCLIVA / CIBERSAM)

The study is titled “Long term effects of peripubertal stress on the thalamic reticular nucleus of female and male mice.” And it has been published in the academic journal Neurobiology of disease. (Source: INCLIVA / CIBERSAM)