november 28, 2006 Symposium
Our first symposium, entitled Fetal Mechanisms in Neurodevelopmental Disorders, was held on November 28, 2006, at the Admiral Fell Inn in Baltimore, Maryland and cosponsored by Kennedy Krieger Institute.
This symposium is illustrative of the kinds of discussions and research we will facilitate and support. A summary of the research topics presented at the symposium has been published in the March 2008 issue of Pediatric Neurology. The abstract is provided below. You may purchase the full article.
Symposium Review
Fetal Mechanisms in Neurodevelopmental Disorders
Susan L. Connors, MD*, Pat Levitt, PhD†, Stephen G. Matthews, PhD‡, Theodore A. Slotkin, PhD¶, Michael V. Johnston, MD*§, Hannah C. Kinney, MD°, William G. Johnson, MD», Rosa M. Dailey¢ and Andrew W Zimmerman, MD*§
From the
*Department of Neurology and Developmental Medicine, Kennedy Krieger Institute, Baltimore, MD;
†Vanderbilt Kennedy Center for Research on Human Development and Department of Pharmacology, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN;
‡Departments of Physiology, Obstetrics and Gynecology and Medicine, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada;
¶Department of Pharmacology and Cancer Biology, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, NC,
°Department of Pathology, Children’s Hospital Boston and Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA;
»Department of Neurology, UMDNJ-Robert Wood Johnson Medical School, Piscataway, NJ;
¢Fetal Physiology Foundation, Baltimore, MD; and
§Department of Neurology, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD;
ABSTRACT
Normal development of the central nervous system depends on complex dynamic mechanisms with multiple spatial and temporal components during gestation. Neurodevelopmental disorders may originate during fetal life from genetic as well as intrauterine and extrauterine factors that affect the fetal-maternal environment. Fetal neurodevelopment depends on cell programs, developmental trajectories, synaptic plasticity and oligodendrocyte maturation, which are variously modifiable by factors such as stress and endocrine disruption, exposure to pesticides such as chlorpyrifos and to drugs such as terbutaline, maternal teratogenic alleles, and premature birth. Current research illustrates how altered fetal mechanisms may affect long-term physiological and behavioral functions of the central nervous system more significantly than they affect its form, and these effects may be transgenerational. This research emphasizes the diversity of such prenatal mechanisms and the need to expand our understanding of how, when altered, they may lead to disordered development, the signs of which may not appear until long after birth.