Most of the research involving the prenatal cocaine exposure has been conducted on young children and young animals. Research on long term consequences of prenatal cocaine exposure in humans will not be forthcoming for many years. We may be able to anticipate such long-term morbidities through animal studies, but as yet there are few relevant studies from which one can make inferences. Those which have been conducted suggest that animals prenatally exposed to drugs show a changing pattern of impairment across their lifespan, particularly with respect to cognitive and physical abilities. We propose as in-depth evaluation of select morbidities across the lifespan in an anima model of prenatal cocaine exposure. To this end we will study brain electrophysiology/sensory function, enhanced stress responsibility, circadian variations in activity levels, physical maturation and life-span. The subjects will be the offspring of female rats who have received either 20 or 40 mg/kg cocaine HCI twice daily (s.c.) from gestation days 7-20, inclusively. Untreated and pair-fed/saline-injected control groups will also be used. All litters will be removed at birth and placed with non-treated surrogate dams to eliminate possible confounding between gestational cocaine administration and postnatal residual effects on maternal behavior or lactational performance. The offspring will be evaluated at different stages of their lifespan This study will advance our understanding about the long-term effects of in utero cocaine exposure.
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