Long-term exercise from adolescence to adulthood reduces anxiety- and depression-like behaviors following maternal immune activation in offspring

Abstract

Maternal immune activation is an environmental risk factor for the development of neuropsychiatric disorders such as anxiety and depression later in life. There is an urgent need to develop therapeutic strategies for treating or preventing psychiatric disorders with developmental origins. There is important information that physical exercise is a therapeutic strategy for treating anxiety and depression-related disorders. This study set out to determine the long-term effects of exercise on anxiety and depression-like behaviors following maternal immune activation in adult offspring. Pregnant mice were treated with lipopolysaccharides (LPS) or vehicle. Then offspring were subjected to a combination of different exercise protocols including voluntary running wheel, swimming, and treadmill exercises from adolescence to adulthood. Anxiety and depression-related symptoms in adult offspring were evaluated using open field, elevated plus maze, sucrose preference test, and forced swim test. The hypothalamic–pituitary–adrenal (HPA) axis reactivity was assessed by measuring corticosterone in serum. We also measured oxytocin, malondialdehyde, tumor necrosis factor (TNF)-α, interleukin (IL)-1β, IL-6, and IL-10 in the brain of adult offspring. Our findings indicated that long-term exercise significantly decreased anxiety- and depression-like behaviors in offspring prenatally exposed to maternal immune activation. The exercise also decreased corticosterone levels in the serum, and increased oxytocin and IL-10 levels in the brain of these offspring; whereas no significant alterations in TNF-α, IL-1β, IL-6 were found. Taken together, this study suggests that exercise might be a therapeutic strategy for the treatment of anxiety and depression-related behaviors following maternal immune activation in offspring.