Figure 1.

Experimental design and the timeline of the procedures. (A) In this study, two groups of young adult male Sprague–Dawley rats were used (n = 16 controls and n = 16 stressed animals). We did repeated in vivo MR imaging and detailed behavioral profiling to assess the effects of chronic stress. (B) MRI measurements were performed on four occasions: first before the stress (baseline), second during the 1st week of the stress exposure (acute stress effect), the third one on the last week of the stress (chronic stress effect), and the last one after 2 weeks of recovery period (recovery effect). We used various behavioral tests to assess the emotional and cognitive status of the animals. Blue arrows indicate the timing of MRI scans and the black arrows specify the behavioral tests.