WIKIMEDIA, ANDREAS REJBRANDFemale rats conditioned to fear a particular smell can transmit that fear to their pups by giving off their own odor alarms, according to a study published in PNAS this week (July 28). The findings suggest a mechanism for how animals might inherit the experiences of their parents.
“During the early days of an infant rat’s life, they are immune to learning information about environmental dangers. But if their mother is the source of threat information, we have shown they can learn from her and produce lasting memories,” Jacek Debiec, a psychiatrist and neuroscientist at the University of Michigan who led the research, said in a press release.
The mother rats were conditioned to fear the smell of peppermint before they were pregnant. In a later experiment after their pups were born, the mothers were put in a chamber and exposed to peppermint. At the same time, their pups—in a separate chamber—were exposed to the air from their mothers’ chamber, which was piped in to them along with the smell of peppermint. In ...
