Fetal Exposure to Ethanol Enhances Pituitary‐Adrenal and Temperature Responses to Etanol in Adult Rats

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Abstract
Long lasting effects of perinatal ethanol exposure were studied in adult rats who were the offspring of dams fed a 5.0% w/v ethanol-containing liquid diet ad libitum or pair-fed the isocaloric control diet during gestation weeks 2 and 3 or during postnatal week 1. Fetal exposure to ethanol reduced body weight of pups at birth unless the ethanol diet was supplemented with casein; neonatal exposure to the ethanol or pair-fed diets, casein supplemented or not, reduced pup weights until day 21 postnatally when weights of all fetally or neo-natalty exposed pups were normal. Between 52 and 120 days of age females were tested for pituitary-adrenal and temperature responses to a challenge dose of ethanol. Prenatally ethanol-exposed rats showed significantly higher plasma corticosterone titers and developed a greater hypothermia in response to an intraperitoneal injection of ethanol (0.75–1.5 g/kg) than did pair-fed controls. Similar response enhancement did not occur in the postnatally ethanol-exposed rats. Temporal patterns of blood ethanol levels after an intraperitoneal injection of ethanol (1.5 g/kg) were similar in prenatally ethanol-exposed females and their pair-fed controls. The data indicate that exposure to ethanol in utero exerts persistent effects on the offspring, rendering them more responsive to the hypothermic and pituitary-adrenal activating effects of alcohol as adults.