McNamara RK, Vannest JJ, Valentine CJ. Role of perinatal long-chain omega-3 fatty acids in cortical circuit maturation: Mechanisms and implications for psychopathology. World J Psychiatr 2015; 5(1): 15-34 [PMID: 25815252 DOI: 10.5498/wjp.v5.i1.15]
Corresponding Author of This Article
Robert K McNamara, PhD, Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Neuroscience, University of Cincinnati College of Medicine, 260 Stetson Street, Cincinnati, OH 45219, United States. robert.mcnamara@uc.edu
Research Domain of This Article
Psychiatry
Article-Type of This Article
Review
Open-Access Policy of This Article
This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
World J Psychiatr. Mar 22, 2015; 5(1): 15-34 Published online Mar 22, 2015. doi: 10.5498/wjp.v5.i1.15
Role of perinatal long-chain omega-3 fatty acids in cortical circuit maturation: Mechanisms and implications for psychopathology
Robert K McNamara, Jennifer J Vannest, Christina J Valentine
Robert K McNamara, Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Neuroscience, University of Cincinnati College of Medicine, Cincinnati, OH 45219, United States
Jennifer J Vannest, Division of Neurology, Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center, Cincinnati, OH 45229, United States
Christina J Valentine, Division of Neonatology, Perinatal Institute, Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center, Cincinnati, OH 45229, United States
Author contributions: McNamara RK wrote the article and Vannest JJ and Valentine CJ contributed intellectual and editorial content.
Supported by NARSAD, Martek Biosciences Inc, The Inflammation Research Foundation (IRF), Ortho-McNeil Janssen, AstraZeneca, Eli Lilly, and was previously a member of the IRF scientific advisory board (McNamara RK); and the Perinatal Institute at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital (Valentine CJ).
Conflict-of-interest: None to declared.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Correspondence to: Robert K McNamara, PhD, Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Neuroscience, University of Cincinnati College of Medicine, 260 Stetson Street, Cincinnati, OH 45219, United States. robert.mcnamara@uc.edu
Telephone: +1-513-5585601 Fax: +1-513-5584805
Received: August 26, 2014 Peer-review started: August 27, 2014 First decision: December 17, 2014 Revised: January 13, 2015 Accepted: February 4, 2015 Article in press: February 9, 2015 Published online: March 22, 2015
Core Tip
Core tip: Although the role of perinatal brain omega-3 fatty acid (DHA) accrual on the maturation and long-term stability of cortical circuitry is only beginning to be fully understood, extant translational evidence suggests that DHA plays a role in the initial development and early maturation of cortical circuits. Emerging evidence from human neuroimaging studies further suggests that psychiatric disorders that initially emerge in childhood and adolescence and associated with low blood DHA levels are characterized by frontal circuit deficits compared with healthy developing youth. Based on existing evidence, these associations could have significant implications for informing novel early intervention strategies aimed at reducing the transmission of psychopathology.
