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Neurobiology

Exciting neurotrophins

Nature volume 401, pages 862–863 (1999)Cite this article

The neurotrophins are a family of secreted proteins named after their ability to regulate the survival and differentiation of nerve cells (‘neuron’ means nerve and ‘trophe’ means nutrient). But there is also evidence1 that neurotrophins are involved in the processes underlying neuronal plasticity — in particular, they cause rapid changes in both the shape and physiology of nerve cells2. Neurotrophins can acutely modulate synaptic processes such as the secretion of neurotransmitter-filled vesicles from nerve endings. And whereas the survival and differentiation functions are usually evident over a period of hours or days, these synaptic effects are detectable within few minutes3.

A study by Kafitz et al.4 on page 918 of this issue shows that neurotrophins may also have effects that were previously assigned to classical excitatory neurotransmitters. They show that neurotrophins can cause membrane depolarization within a few milliseconds, eventually leading to the firing of an action potential. These new data imply that, at certain synapses, neurotrophins not only modulate chemical transmission but they are the very compounds that mediate it.

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Figure 1: Model for membrane depolarization by brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF), proposed by Kafitz et al.4.

References

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Biology, University of California San Diego, 9500 Gilman Drive, La Jolla, 92093-0357, California, USA

    Benedikt Berninger & Mu-ming Poo

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  1. Benedikt Berninger
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  2. Mu-ming Poo
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Correspondence to Mu-ming Poo.

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Berninger, B., Poo, Mm. Exciting neurotrophins. Nature 401, 862–863 (1999). https://doi.org/10.1038/44727

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