Dealing with stressful situations is a universal experience. While most individuals are able to adapt to stress, some will develop stress-related disorders. The mechanisms that underlie resilience and adaptive capacity to stress remain largely unknown. Understanding these mechanisms could improve therapies and preventive strategies for stress-related conditions. While animal models exhibit similar resilient or susceptible responses to those observed in humans and have been used to study stress responses, most animal studies focus on isolated brain areas. Given the complexity of stress, a broader view of large-scale brain network changes in the face of stress would be beneficial.

A recent preprint (not yet peer-reviewed) used a transgenic mouse model (ArcTRAP) to visualize activity in specific neuron populations in the whole brain and map dynamic brain network changes before and during stress. Researchers exposed mice to a stress protocol before dividing them into susceptible and resilient groups based on stress scores during behavioral assessments, with the susceptible group showing higher score variability. Animals from both groups were euthanized after stress exposure to analyze brain activity across the whole brain. In susceptible mice, more cells across the retrosplenial cortex showed increased activity in response to stress. The lateral orbital area exhibited higher baseline activity before stress. Network analysis revealed that, prior to stress exposure, susceptible mice displayed stronger correlations between the default mode network (DMN) and the lateral cortical network (LCN), networks associated with human psychopathology.

处理压力情况是一种普遍的经历。虽然大多数人能够适应压力，但有些人会患上与压力相关的疾病。支撑复原力和对压力的适应能力的机制在很大程度上仍然未知。了解这些机制可以改进压力相关疾病的治疗和预防策略。虽然动物模型表现出与在人类中观察到的反应相似的弹性或易感反应，并已被用于研究压力反应，但大多数动物研究都集中在孤立的大脑区域。鉴于压力的复杂性，在面对压力时更广泛地了解大规模大脑网络变化将是有益的。

最近的预印本（尚未经过同行评审）使用转基因小鼠模型 （ArcTRAP） 来可视化整个大脑中特定神经元群的活动，并绘制压力前后动态大脑网络变化。研究人员在行为评估期间根据压力评分将小鼠分为易感组和弹性组之前，将小鼠暴露于压力方案中，易感组表现出更高的分数变异性。两组动物在应激暴露后均被安乐死，以分析整个大脑的大脑活动。在易感小鼠中，脾后皮层的更多细胞在应激下表现出增加的活动。外侧眼眶区域在应激前表现出较高的基线活动。网络分析显示，在压力暴露之前，易感小鼠在默认模式网络 （DMN） 和外侧皮层网络 （LCN） 之间表现出更强的相关性，这些网络与人类精神病理学相关。