[Legislation of New Psychoactive Substances in the Netherlands].

Every year dozens of New Psychoactive Substances (NPS) appear for the first time on the drug market. Many of them will never find their way to a user group. If they do and a NPS is banned because of its harmfulness, a legal variant subsequently appears on the market.

Cannabis adulterated with the synthetic cannabinoid receptor agonist MDMB-4en-PINACA and the role of European drug checking services.

Background: European drug checking services exchange information on drug trends within the Trans European Drug Information (TEDI) network, allowing monitoring and coordination of responses. Starting in Spring 2020, several services detected the synthetic cannabinoid receptor agonist MDMB-4en-PINACA in adulterated low-THC cannabis products.

Methods: Cannabis products suspected of adulteration were analyzed for the presence of MDMB-4en-PINACA by 9 services in 8 countries within the TEDI network.

Alterations in Apical Dendrite Bundling in the Somatosensory Cortex of 5-HT(3A) Receptor Knockout Mice.

In various species and areas of the cerebral cortex, apical dendrites of pyramidal neurons form clusters which extend through several layers of the cortex also known as dendritic bundles. Previously, it has been shown that 5-HT(3A) receptor knockout mice show hypercomplex apical dendrites of cortical layer 2/3 pyramidal neurons, together with a reduction in reelin levels, a glycoprotein involved in cortical development. Other studies showed that in the mouse presubicular cortex, reelin is involved in the formation of modular structures.

Prenatal fluoxetine exposure induces life-long serotonin 5-HT₃ receptor-dependent cortical abnormalities and anxiety-like behaviour.

Selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) are the first choice of drugs to treat depression and anxiety during pregnancy. However, there is evidence that in utero exposure to SSRIs leads to adverse effects in offspring. Here we show that in mice, the adverse effects of the widely used antidepressant and SSRI fluoxetine are critically dependent on the 5-HT(3) receptor, the only ligand-gated ion channel in the family of serotonin receptors.

Impaired Social Behavior in 5-HT(3A) Receptor Knockout Mice.

The 5-HT(3) receptor is a ligand-gated ion channel expressed on interneurons throughout the brain. So far, analysis of the 5-HT(3A) knockout mouse revealed changes in nociceptive processing and a reduction in anxiety related behavior. Recently, it was shown that the 5-HT(3) receptor is also expressed on Cajal-Retzius cells which play a key role in cortical development and that knockout mice lacking this receptor showed aberrant growth of the dendritic tree of cortical layer II/III pyramidal neurons.

Lifelong impact of variations in maternal care on dendritic structure and function of cortical layer 2/3 pyramidal neurons in rat offspring.

Maternal licking and grooming (LG) exerts profound influence on hippocampal development and function in the offspring. However, little information is available on the effects of variations in maternal care on other brain regions. Here we examined the effects of variation in the frequency of maternal LG on morphological and electrophysiological properties of layer 2/3 pyramidal neurons in the somatosensory cortex in adult offspring.