A novel double-hit animal model of schizophrenia: behavioural assessment in male and female mice

Abstract

Background: A growing body of evidence support that maternal prenatal infections represent a risk factor for schizophrenia in offspring. Moreover, stressful events during critical neurodevelopmental periods, such as adolescence, may trigger the onset of the disease in predisposed individuals. Thus, a prenatal priming event (i.e. maternal infection during pregnancy) that would induce vulnerability, followed by a second stressful hit in peripuberty may lead to the onset of schizophrenia