Fig. 5.
Social behaviour defects observed in phospholipase C-β1 (PLC-β1−/−) mice are not present in medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC)-specific PLC-β1 knockdown mice. (A) Social behaviour tests were performed in an open-field box (bottom) containing 2 wire cages (top), 1 enclosing a stranger mouse and the other containing novel objects. (B) Total sniffing time was reduced for PLC-β1−/− mice compared with PLC-β1+/+ mice (PLC-β1−/−: n = 11, PLC-β1+/+: n = 9; p < 0.001, 2-tailed t test). (C) The PLC-β1+/+ mice spent more time sniffing the stranger mouse than the novel objects (F1,16 = 12.854, p = 0.002). The PLC-β1−/− mice showed no difference in sniffing time between the stranger mouse and novel objects (F1,20 = 3.351, p = 0.08). (D) Small hairpin (sh)PLC-β1-injected mice showed no difference in total sniffing time compared with scrambled sequence (shSCR)-injected mice (shPLC-β1: n = 13, shSCR: n = 10; p = 0.68, 2-tailed t test). (E) The shPLC-β1-injected mice spent more time sniffing the stranger mouse than the novel objects (F1,24 = 48.306, p < 0.001), a behaviour similar to that of shSCR-injected mice (F1,18 = 23.050, p < 0.001). Data are presented as means ± standard errors of the mean. *p < 0.05, **p < 0.01, ***p < 0.001, 2-tailed t test and 1-way analysis of variance.