Modeling Neuropsychiatric Diseases and Drug Responses in Zebrafish

Zebrafish has emerged as a powerful vertebrate model for neuropsychiatric drug research, offering unique advantages for high-throughput screening, behavioral phenotyping, and mechanistic evaluation of therapeutic compounds. Its genetic tractability, optical transparency, and conserved neurochemical pathways enable the modeling of complex brain disorders such as autism spectrum disorders, schizophrenia, depression, and epilepsy. Exposure to neuroactive agents like pentylenetetrazole (PTZ), valproic acid, and scopolamine elicits robust, quantifiable behavioral and molecular phenotypes, including seizure-like activity, impaired social behavior, and altered expression of neuroinflammatory and neuromodulatory markers. Furthermore, zebrafish models integrate transcriptomic, proteomic, and toxicity data, enabling a comprehensive assessment of both therapeutic efficacy and safety. Automated imaging and behavioral tracking systems, along with CRISPR-based genetic models, facilitate the discovery of genotype-specific drug responses and novel neuroactive candidates. By bridging in vitro and mammalian models, zebrafish contribute to personalized neuropsychopharmacology and accelerate the translation of basic neuroscience into clinically actionable strategies.