Early childhood schizophrenia (COS) is a rare condition and has no established animal model to test new treatments. Previous studies have shown that repeated doses of 25 mg/kg ketamine produce schizophrenia‐like changes in adult male Wistar rats, but adequate doses of ketamine in animal COS studies are not yet known. Male and female Wistar rats, 23 days old, received an injection of ketamine or intraperitoneal saline (i.p.) for 8 days. The animals underwent different behavioral tests: open field, social interaction, pre‐pulse startle inhibition (PPI). Female rats showed behavioral changes at all ketamine doses (5, 15, 25 and 50 mg/kg), in contrast to males that only at 50 mg/kg dose had interrupted PPI and higher stereotypy in the open field test. The present study demonstrated that ketamine at a dose of 50 mg/kg once daily from 23 to 31 days postnatal reproduced changes similar to schizophrenia in pre‐pubertal male and female Wistar rats and could be used, with other interventions, in future studies with animals in COS.

中文翻译：

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氯胺酮对青春期前 Wistar 大鼠的影响：对儿童期精神分裂症行为参数的影响

儿童早期精神分裂症 (COS) 是一种罕见疾病，目前还没有建立的动物模型来测试新的治疗方法。先前的研究表明，重复剂量的 25 mg/kg 氯胺酮会在成年雄性 Wistar 大鼠中产生精神分裂症样变化，但尚不清楚动物 COS 研究中足够剂量的氯胺酮。雄性和雌性 Wistar 大鼠，23 天大，接受氯胺酮或腹腔盐水 (ip) 注射 8 天。这些动物接受了不同的行为测试：开放场、社交互动、脉冲前惊恐抑制（PPI）。雌性大鼠在所有氯胺酮剂量（5、15、25 和 50 毫克/千克）下均表现出行为变化，而雄性大鼠仅在 50 毫克/千克剂量下才中断了 PPI，并在露天试验中产生了更高的刻板印象。