Prefrontal cortical microglial transcriptome after prenatal opioid exposure

While much has been done to mitigate the effects of opioids during the neonatal period, long-term neurodevelopmental studies remain challenging in the human population. To address this, we rely on a mouse model and recently found that prenatal morphine (MO) exposure induced sex-dependent executive function deficits in adult offspring using the 5-choice serial reaction time task (5CSTT). Given the important role of microglia in shaping the developing brain, it is possible that shifts in microglia phenotype may contribute to executive function deficits after prenatal MO exposure. To comprehensively characterize microglial responses in the prefrontal cortex (PFC), whole transcriptome analyses were performed following prenatal MO exposure in male and female offspring. We predicted that prenatal MO exposure would cause sex-specific gene expression changes in PFC microglia, and these could relate to offspring executive function outcomes in the 5CSRTT.