Neurodevelopmental, Gestational, Lactational and Maternal Immune Stimulation Animal Model for Schizophrenia

Fields of Interest
Pharmacology of schizophrenia, animal models of psychopathology, neurodevelopmental model of schizophrenia.
Prof. Weiner's lab has launched and developed the latent inhibition model of schizophrenia which mimics loss of normal attentional control in this disorder, with a focus on the pharmacology of latent inhibition as a basis for the search for novel drugs. In recent years, the laboratory has focused on a neurodevelopmental model of schizophrenia based on a well known risk factor, namely, maternal infection. In addition to long term schizophrenia-like behavioral abnormalities observed in the adult offspring, brain imaging is used to unravel schizophrenia-like brain structural abnormalities that develop in these offspring.

Main interest concerns the possibility of prevention of "schizophrenia' in the model. Recent findings reveal that the emergence of both behavioral and brain structural abnormalities in adulthood can be prevented by pharmacological treatments given during an asymptomatic period of adolescence.

Project manager

avi Wener
Research services

Project researchers

Ina Weiner
T.A.U Tel Aviv University, Social Sciences
The School oh Psychological Sciences