Fig 5. Artificial genital touch drives genital cortex expansion and promotes female sexual maturation.

(A) Control, prepubescent female rats (postnatal day [P]23) were placed each day 3 times for 10 minutes in a box across 7 days without further treatment. (B) Artificial genital touch; prepubescent female rats (P23) were placed each day 3 times for 10 minutes in a box across for 7 days, and their clitoris and vulva were stroked with a lubricated brush by a human (female) experimenter. (C) Outline of a somatosensory cortex (S1) map from the brain of a P30 female who received the control treatment described in A. Genital cortex is depicted in black. (D) Same as (C), but example map stems from the brain of a P30 female, whose genitals were brushed as described in (B). (E), Absolute area of clitoris representation in hemispheres of P30 females, which underwent control (A) or artificial genital touch (B) treatment. (F) Same as (E), but the fraction of genital cortex of the S1 is plotted. (G) Same as (E), but the absolute area of S1 is shown for the 2 groups. There is no difference in S1 size. (H) Mean scores for vaginal opening for P30 females, which underwent control (A) or artificial genital touch (B) treatment. (I) Picture showing the uterus of a female, which underwent control (A) or artificial genital touch (B) treatment. (J) Uterine weights of females that underwent control (A) or artificial genital touch (B) treatment. See also S1 Data.