Maternal Type-I interferon signaling adversely affects the microglia and the behavior of the offspring accompanied by increased sensitivity to stress.

ABSTRACT: Viral infection during pregnancy is often associated with neuropsychiatric conditions. In mice, exposure of pregnant dams to the viral mimetic poly(I:C), serves as a model that simulates such pathology in the offspring, through a process known as Maternal Immune Activation (MIA). To investigate the mechanism of such effect, we hypothesized that maternal upregulation of Type-I interferon (IFN-I), as part of the dam's antiviral response, might contribute to the damage imposed on the offspring. Using mRNA sequencing and flow cytometry analyses we found that poly(I:C) treatment during pregnancy caused reduced expression of genes related to proliferation and cell cycle in the offspring's microglia relative to controls. This was found to be associated with an IFN-I signature in the embryonic yol

SUBMITTER: Ben-Yehuda H 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7192855 | biostudies-literature | 2020 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature