New Paper: Prevention of schizophrenia deficits via non-invasive adolescent frontal cortex stimulation in rats

Hadar R, Winter R, Callesen HE, Wieske F, Habelt B, Khadka N, Felgel-Farnholz V, Barroeta-Hlusicka E, Reis J, Tatarau CA, Funke K, Fritsch B, Bernhardt N, Bikson M, Nitsche MA, Winter C. 2018. Prevention of schizophrenia deficits via non-invasive adolescent frontal cortex stimulation in rats. Nature Molecular Psychiatry. 2019. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41380-019-0356-x. PDF

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Abstract

Schizophrenia is a severe neurodevelopmental psychiatric affliction manifested behaviorally at late adolescence/early adulthood. Current treatments comprise antipsychotics which act solely symptomatic, are limited in their effectiveness and often associated with side-effects. We here report that application of non-invasive transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) during adolescence, prior to schizophrenia-relevant behavioral manifestation, prevents the development of positive symptoms and related neurobiological alterations in the maternal immune stimulation (MIS) model of schizophrenia.