High-fat diets (HFDs) during pregnancy may damage the neural development and emotional behavior of rat offspring. Therefore, we investigated the neurobehavioral development of rat offspring who were fed a control diet (CD) or an HFD with lard (HFD-lard) or canola oil (HFD-canola oil), during pregnancy. Offspring's neurodevelopment (somatic growth, physical maturation, and ontogenesis reflex) was assessed while they were suckling. The rat's levels of depression, anxiety, and aggression were assessed through forced swimming, elevation plus a maze or open field test, and a foot-shock test on postnatal days 60, 80, and 110, respectively. Maternal HFDs with lard or canola oil promoted rats' offspring during suckling. They had reduced body weight and growth, physical maturation delay (auditory conduit and eyes opening to both groups HFDs-lard and canola oil; ear unfolding and incisor eruption only HFD-lard) and an ontogenesis reflex (palm grasp/vibrissa placing to both groups HFDs-lard and canola oil, and free-fall righting only in HFD-lard). Negative geotaxis resulted in the faster development of the HFD-lard offspring. Furthermore, in adulthood, the HDFs-offspring were more likely to be overweight, have shorter swimming times in the swim test, greater susceptibility to anxiety with an increased time spent in the closed arm in the elevated plus-maze while spending less time in the open arm, and having a decreased number of crossings and rearing in the open field. On the other hand, aggressive-like behavior was not affected. Therefore, these findings indicate that maternal HFDs enriched with lard or canola oil during pregnancy can impair the neurodevelopment of rat offspring and can perhaps be associated with possible changes to the emotional behavior of adult offspring.
Keywords: Aggressiveness; Anxiety; Depression; Maternal nutrition; Phenotypic plasticity; Reflex ontogeny.
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