Molecular biological and molecular physiological analysis of the function of OXTR in maternal behavior and parturition.

以催产素受体（OXTR）敲除小鼠和OXTR- venus敲除小鼠为实验对象，分析了产后诱导母性行为时，催产素受体（OXTR）表达的变化。结果表明，在分娩后和母性行为诱导过程中，表明OXTR表达的venus阳性细胞数量在内侧视前区（MPOA）和视上核（SON）中显著增加，视上核是母性行为的重要区域，而视上核是大多数OXT释放细胞的分布区域。在人工（或强迫）诱导母性行为后，还检测到处女雌性小鼠MPOA和SON中维纳斯阳性细胞的增加。另一方面，我们从OXTR（-/-）、Fp（-/-）双敲除雌性小鼠的子宫中，在诱导分娩后制备，新克隆了几个tgf - β相关基因产物，作为一种有效的“分娩调节因子”。

sing oxytocin receptor (OXTR)knockout mice and OXTR-Venus knockin mice, we analyzed the alteration in the expression of OXTR, when maternal behavior was induced after parturition. In the result, the number of Venus-positive cells, indicating expression of OXTR, increased significantly in the medial preoptic area (MPOA), known to be an essential region for maternal behavior, and in the supraoptic nucleus (SON), where most of OXT releasing cells are distributed, after parturition and during induction of maternal behavior. The increase of Venus-positive cells in MPOA and the SON in the virgin female mice after artificial (or forced)induction of maternal behavior were also detected. On the other hand, we newly cloned several TGF-beta related gene product as a potent"parturition-regulatory factors", from uterus of OXTR(-/-), Fp(-/-)double knockout female mice, prepared just after induced parturition.