ArticlePloS one2017
Early life stress-induced alterations in rat brain structures measured with high resolution MRI.
Article in PloS one, 2017. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 19 papers.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
19 citing papers in PubMed, 44 citations in OpenAlex.
- Neurodevelopmental effects of early life stress: PFC and cognition.Neuroscience and biobehavioral reviews · 2026Review
- Glucocorticoids and cell fate in the developing brain: Neuroendocrine mechanisms shaping developmental trajectories.Journal of neuroendocrinology · 2026Review
- Translational models of stress and resilience: An applied neuroscience methodology review.Neuroscience applied · 2024Review
- Glucocorticoid Receptor (GR) antagonism as disease-modifying treatment for MDD with childhood trauma: protocol of the RESET-medication randomized controlled trial.BMC psychiatry · 2023Article
- Life Event Stress and Reduced Cortical Thickness in Youth at Clinical High Risk for Psychosis and Healthy Control Subjects.Biological psychiatry. Cognitive neuroscience and neuroimaging · 2022Article
- The impact of early life maternal deprivation on the perineuronal nets in the prefrontal cortex and hippocampus of young adult rats.Frontiers in cell and developmental biology · 2022Article
- Complex Housing, but Not Maternal Deprivation Affects Motivation to Liberate a Trapped Cage-Mate in an Operant Rat Task.Frontiers in behavioral neuroscience · 2021Article
- The Effects of Early Life Stress on the Brain and Behaviour: Insights From Zebrafish Models.Frontiers in cell and developmental biology · 2021Review
- Article
- Neural meaning making, prediction, and prefrontal-subcortical development following early adverse caregiving.Development and psychopathology · 2020Review
- The relevance of a rodent cohort in the Consortium on Individual Development.Developmental cognitive neuroscience · 2020Article
- Distinct structure-function relationships across cortical regions and connectivity scales in the rat brain.Scientific reports · 2020Article
- Mechanisms of Shared Vulnerability to Post-traumatic Stress Disorder and Substance Use Disorders.Frontiers in behavioral neuroscience · 2020Review
- Large-scale white matter network reorganization in posttraumatic stress disorder.Human brain mapping · 2019Article
- Preclinical neuroimaging of gene-environment interactions in psychiatric disease.The British journal of radiology · 2019Review
- Enriched environment modulates behavior, myelination and augments molecules governing the plasticity in the forebrain region of rats exposed to chronic immobilization stress.Metabolic brain disease · 2019Article
- Early Life Adversity and Adult Social Behavior: Focus on Arginine Vasopressin and Oxytocin as Potential Mediators.Frontiers in behavioral neuroscience · 2019Review
- Stress, alcohol and infection during early development: A brief review of common outcomes and mechanisms.Journal of neuroendocrinology · 2018Review
- Diffusion MRI-based cortical connectome reconstruction: dependency on tractography procedures and neuroanatomical characteristics.Brain structure & function · 2018Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
5 authors at 2 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Adverse experiences early in life impair cognitive function both in rodents and humans. In humans this increases the vulnerability to develop mental illnesses while in the rodent brain early life stress (ELS) abnormalities are associated with changes in synaptic plasticity, excitability and microstructure. Detailed information on the effects of ELS on rodent brain structural integrity at large and connectivity within the brain is currently lacking; this information is highly relevant for understanding the mechanism by which early life stress predisposes to mental illnesses. Here, we exposed rats to 24 hours of maternal deprivation (MD) at postnatal day 3, a paradigm known to increase corticosterone levels and thereby activate glucocorticoid receptors in the brain. Using structural magnetic resonance imaging we examined: i) volumetric changes and white/grey matter properties of the whole cerebrum and of specific brain areas; and ii) whether potential alterations could be normalized by blocking glucocorticoid receptors with mifepristone during the critical developmental window of early adolescence, i.e. between postnatal days 26 and 28. The results show that MD caused a volumetric reduction of the prefrontal cortex, particularly the ventromedial part, and the orbitofrontal cortex. Within the whole cerebrum, white (relative to grey) matter volume was decreased and region-specifically in prefrontal cortex and dorsomedial striatum following MD. A trend was found for the hippocampus. Grey matter fractions were not affected. Treatment with mifepristone did not normalize these changes. This study indicates that early life stress in rodents has long lasting consequences for the volume and structural integrity of the brain. However, changes were relatively modest and-unlike behavior- not mitigated by blockade of glucocorticoid receptors during a critical developmental period.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.