Environmentally enriched pigs have transcriptional profiles consistent with neuroprotective effects and reduced microglial activity

Behavioural Brain Research
Sarah M BrownAlistair B Lawrence

Abstract

Environmental enrichment (EE) is widely used to study the effects of external factors on brain development, function and health in rodent models, but very little is known of the effects of EE on the brain in a large animal model such as the pig. Twenty-four young pigs (aged 5 weeks at start of study, 1:1 male: female ratio) were housed in environmentally enriched (EE) pens and provided with additional enrichment stimulation (a bag filled with straw) once daily. Litter, weight and sex matched controls n= (24) were housed in barren (B) conditions. Behaviour was recorded on alternate days from study day 10. After 21 days, RNA-sequencing of the frontal cortex of male piglets culled one hour after the enrichment stimulation, but not those at 4 h after stimulation, showed upregulation of genes involved in neuronal activity and synaptic plasticity in the EE compared to the B condition. This result is mirrored in the behavioural response to the stimulation which showed a peak in activity around the 1 h time-point. By contrast, EE piglets displayed a signature consistent with a relative decrease in microglial activity compared to those in the B condition. These results confirm those from rodents, suggesting that EE may also confer neuro...Continue Reading

Citations

Jun 20, 2020·ILAR Journal·Kathleen R Pritchett-Corning
Jun 26, 2020·Frontiers in Veterinary Science·Lu LuoJ Elizabeth Bolhuis
Dec 12, 2020·Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Reviews·Rebecca AlexanderCharis Styliadis
Aug 7, 2021·Biology Direct·Marcus Augusto-Oliveira, Alexei Verkhratsky

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Datasets Mentioned

BETA
PRJEB24165

Methods Mentioned

BETA
sedation
dissections

Software Mentioned

Graphia Professional
PANTHER
Ensembl BioMart
R
Kallisto
edgeR
Minitab
db
Bioconductor package
GSEA

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