The present study investigated the impacts of alcohol, nicotine, and their co-administration during pregnancy and lactation on sensory information processing including visual, tactile, and auditory discrimination in adult NMRI mice offspring. Pregnant mice were injected with saline or 20% alcohol (3 g/kg), or nicotine (1 mg/kg) or their co-administration alcohol+nicotine, intraperitoneally until the end of lactation. The offspring were separated from their mothers after lactation period on postnatal day (PND) 28. The locomotor activity, novel object recognition-dependent on visual system (NOR-VS), novel texture discrimination- dependent on somatosensory system (NTR-SS), and acoustic startle reflex were evaluated in PND90. The results revealed no statistical significance for locomotor activity of alcohol, nicotine, and co-administration alcohol+nicotine groups compared to the saline group in the open field task. The results, however, showed a significant decline in the ability of novel object discrimination in the nicotine and co-administration alcohol + nicotine groups compared to the saline group (P < 0.05) in the NOR-VS task. In the NTR-SS and acoustic startle reflex tasks, texture discrimination and the prepulse inhibition abilities in the offspring administered with nicotine and alcohol alone were reduced when compared to the saline group. Also, co-administration of alcohol+nicotine groups showed a decline in the aforementioned tests compared to the saline group (P <0.05). Administration of alcohol and nicotine during fetal and postpartum development disrupts sensory processing of inputs of visual, tactile, and auditory systems in adult mice.
Keywords: Acoustic startle reflex; Alcohol; Mice; Nicotine; Tactile learning.
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