Heure: 11:00
Lieu: Salle F-1455
Centre de recherche CERVO
Quebec, Quebec G1J 2G3Une présentation de:

Derya Sargin

Department of Psychology
The Hotchkiss Brain Institute
The Alberta Children’s Hospital Research Institute
University of Calgary

Early life experiences can have enduring effects on brain function and behaviour, yet these effects differ between females and males. My research program examines how social and environmental adversity shapes stress vulnerability and socioemotional regulation across the lifespan. By integrating transgenic mouse models, circuit-level neuroscience, and human neuroimaging and postmortem approaches, we investigate the neural mechanisms underlying sex-specific responses to stress. Over the past six years, my lab has identified previously unrecognized orexinergic and serotonergic circuits that regulate social behaviour and stress responses in a sex-dependent manner. In this talk, I will present the long-term consequences of chronic unpredictable stress during adolescence in mice. Following exposure to a second-hit stressor during adulthood, both male and female mice with a history of adolescent stress displayed reduced social preference and increased time in the center of an open field, suggesting persistent alterations in social behaviour and risk-related decision-making. Brain-wide analysis of functional connectivity during acute stress revealed marked baseline differences between females and males. Adolescent stress was also associated with an overall reduction in significant functional connections, with more pronounced network disruption in females. Together, these findings demonstrate that adolescent stress produces enduring, sex-dependent alterations in socioemotional behaviour and stress-responsive neural networks. This work provides mechanistic insight into how adolescent adversity may contribute to sex-specific vulnerability to stress-related neuropsychiatric disorders.