Sensory neurostimulation promotes stress resilience with frequency-specificity

Chronic stress is a major risk factor for neuropsychiatric disorders, acting via increased neuroinflammation and disrupted synaptic plasticity. While non-invasive visual or audiovisual neurostimulation (AV flicker) at 40Hz has been shown to modulate brain immune signaling and improve cognitive performance in mouse models of Alzheimer’s disease, its effects in the context of stress remain unknown. Here we show that AV flicker protects against stress-induced behavioral, microglial, astrocytic, and synaptic changes in a sex- and frequency-specific manner. Male and female mice underwent 28 days of chronic unpredictable stress with concomitant daily AV flicker exposure at 10Hz, 20Hz, or 40Hz. Stress-induced behaviors were most effectively mitigated by 10Hz AV flicker in males and 40Hz AV flicker in females. In the medial prefrontal cortex, AV flicker normalized the balance of mature and immature dendritic spines and counteracted stress-induced molecular changes in neurons, microglia, and astrocytes, including in key neuropsychiatric risk genes. These findings show that frequency optimized AV flicker induces resilience to chronic stress.