Synaptic plasticity articles within Nature Communications

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  • Article
    | Open Access

    Endocannabinoid levels are controlled by the fine balance between their synthesis and degradation. Here, the authors show that memory formation through fear conditioning selectively accelerates the degradation of endocannabinoids in the cerebellum via a lasting increase in GABA release.

    • Christophe J. Dubois
    • , Jessica Fawcett-Patel
    •  & Siqiong June Liu

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Acute administration of EPA impairs learning and memory and hippocampal LTP in mice that was mediated through enhancing GABAergic transmission via the 5-HT6R. DHA can prevent EPA-induced impairments at a ratio of EPA to DHA similar to that in marine fish oil via the 5-HT2CR.

    • Ji-Hong Liu
    • , Qian Wang
    •  & Tian-Ming Gao

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Transport of membrane proteins within the cell is thought to mainly rely on microtubule-based transport, but the role of microtubules in neuronal cell recycling of synaptic vesicles is unclear. Here, the authors show that axonal movement of recycling vesicles may be driven not by microtubules but primarily by actin polymerization.

    • Nicolas Chenouard
    • , Feng Xuan
    •  & Richard W. Tsien

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Cell surface proteins contribute to neuronal development and activity-dependent synaptic plasticity. Here, the authors perform a time-resolved surfaceome analysis of developing primary neurons and in response to homeostatic synaptic scaling and chemical long-term potentiation (cLTP), revealing surface proteome remodeling largely independent of global proteostasis.

    • Marc van Oostrum
    • , Benjamin Campbell
    •  & Bernd Wollscheid

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Inhibitory interneuron subtypes differentially control place cell representations in CA1. Here, the authors show that parvalbumin and somatostatin interneuron synapses onto CA1 pyramidal neurons exhibit distinct plasticity mechanisms and incorporating this insight into circuit-level modeling leads to stable place cell representations.

    • Matt Udakis
    • , Victor Pedrosa
    •  & Jack R. Mellor

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Presynaptic spike timing-dependent long-term depression at hippocampal CA3-CA1 synapses is evident until the third postnatal week in mice. The authors show that maturation beyond four weeks is associated with a switch to long-term potentiation in which astrocytes play a central role.

    • Rafael Falcón-Moya
    • , Mikel Pérez-Rodríguez
    •  & Antonio Rodríguez-Moreno

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Stein, Barbosa et al. show that anti-NMDAR encephalitis and schizophrenia are characterized by reduced serial dependence in spatial working memory. Cortical network simulations show that this can be parsimoniously explained by a reduction in NMDAR-dependent short-term synaptic potentiation in these diseases.

    • Heike Stein
    • , Joao Barbosa
    •  & Albert Compte

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Inhibition in spinal nociceptive pathways is weaker and more labile in lamina I —where thermal input is primarily processed— than in lamina II that encodes predominantly high threshold mechanical input. This explains why noxious thermal input makes spinal circuits prone to catastrophic sensitization.

    • Francesco Ferrini
    • , Jimena Perez-Sanchez
    •  & Yves De Koninck

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Bellec et al. present a mathematically founded approximation for gradient descent training of recurrent neural networks without backwards propagation in time. This enables biologically plausible training of spike-based neural network models with working memory and supports on-chip training of neuromorphic hardware.

    • Guillaume Bellec
    • , Franz Scherr
    •  & Wolfgang Maass

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Fragile X Mental Retardation Protein regulates synaptic plasticity and its loss results in Fragile X Syndrome. Here, the authors show that the FMRP(1-297)-tat peptide can permeate the BBB, restore protein translation and mossy fiber LTP, and reduce elevated levels of activity in Fmr1 KO mice.

    • Xiaoqin Zhan
    • , Hadhimulya Asmara
    •  & Ray W. Turner

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Enduring changes in synaptic efficacy are highly sensitive to stress. Here, the authors show that astrocytic delivery of metabolites has an important role in the stress-mediated impairment of synaptic plasticity.

    • Ciaran Murphy-Royal
    • , April D. Johnston
    •  & Grant R. Gordon

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The formation of functional synaptic clusters (FSCs) and their impact on somatic membrane potential (sVm) in vivo are poorly understood. Here, the authors develop a computational approach to show that FSCs have to form via local rather than global plasticity and be moderately large to impact sVm.

    • Balázs B. Ujfalussy
    •  & Judit K. Makara

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Previous studies implicate the hippocampal–amygdala pathway in contextual fear conditioning, in which animals learn to associate a neutral context with an aversive stimulus and display fear responses to dangerous situations. Here the authors show that selective strengthening of hippocampal–amygdala pathway contributes to encoding adaptive fear memory for threat-predictive context.

    • Woong Bin Kim
    •  & Jun-Hyeong Cho

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The mechanisms underlying the maturation of learning and memory abilities are poorly understood. Here, authors show that episodic learning produces persistent neuronal activation, BDNF-dependent increase in excitatory synapse markers (synaptophysin and PSD-95), and significant maturation of AMPA receptor synaptic responses in the hippocampus of infant rats and mice compared to juveniles and adults.

    • Benjamin Bessières
    • , Alessio Travaglia
    •  & Cristina M. Alberini

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Sensory stimuli usually arrive simultaneously but the neural-circuit mechanisms that combine multiple streams of sensory information are incompletely understood. The authors here show that visual-auditory pairing drives plasticity in multi-modal neuron networks within the mouse visual cortex.

    • Thomas Knöpfel
    • , Yann Sweeney
    •  & Samuel J. Barnes

  • Article
    | Open Access

    There is growing evidence that autophagy might serve specialized functions in neurons besides its role in protein homeostasis. In this study, authors demonstrate that axonal retrograde transport of BDNF/TrkB in neuronal amphisomes is involved in plasticity-relevant local signaling at presynaptic boutons and that SIPA1L2, a member of the SIPA1L family of neuronal RapGAPs, associates via LC3b to TrkB-containing amphisomes to regulate its motility and signaling at the axon terminals

    • Maria Andres-Alonso
    • , Mohamed Raafet Ammar
    •  & Michael R. Kreutz

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The mechanisms regulating the turnover of the AMPARs in the synapse, which is critically important to sustain basic synaptic activity, remains unclear. In this study, authors used single-molecule imaging techniques to demonstrate that AMPAR tetramers are not stable entities and readily fall apart to dimers and monomers that could reform to tetramers at the synapse, and that rapidly diffusing monomers in the plasma membrane are primarily responsible for the AMPAR turnover in the synapse.

    • Jyoji Morise
    • , Kenichi G. N. Suzuki
    •  & Shogo Oka

  • Article
    | Open Access

    It’s well known that hippocampal synaptic plasticity and memory are impaired in experimental models of metabolic diseases, however, it is unclear if maternal diet or metabolic alterations around the gestational age may multigenerationally affect learning and memory. In this study, authors demonstrate that maternal high fat diet-dependent insulin resistance affects synaptic plasticity and memory of descendants until the third generation via reduced exon specific brain-derived neurotrophic factor expression in the hippocampus of descendants

    • Salvatore Fusco
    • , Matteo Spinelli
    •  & Claudio Grassi

  • Article
    | Open Access

    How are stable memories maintained in the brain despite significant ongoing fluctuations in synaptic strengths? Here, the authors show that a model consistent with fluctuations, homeostasis and biologically plausible learning rules, naturally leads to memories implemented as dynamic attractors.

    • Lee Susman
    • , Naama Brenner
    •  & Omri Barak

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Multiplexed imaging of synaptic proteins can provide useful information on the heterogeneity of synaptic architecture and plasticity. Here the authors use high affinity locked nucleic acid probes and low affinity DNA imaging probes to achieve multiplexed confocal and super-resolution imaging of synaptic and cytoskeletal proteins.

    • Syuan-Ming Guo
    • , Remi Veneziano
    •  & Mark Bathe

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Caspase-2 is constitutively expressed in neurons yet its physiological function is not known. Here, the authors report a role for Caspase-2 activity in synaptic plasticity via a reduction in dendritic spine density through cleavage of Rictor suggesting a mechanism to explain the impairments in cognitive flexibility observed in Caspase-2 knockout mice.

    • Zhi-Xiang Xu
    • , Ji-Wei Tan
    •  & Baoji Xu

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Asymmetric subcellular mRNA distribution is important for local translation of neuronal mRNAs. Here the authors employed MS2 live-cell imaging and showed that the reporter mRNA containing the 3’ UTR of Rgs4 shows an anterograde transport bias, dependent on neuronal activity and the protein Staufen2, and mediates sustained mRNA recruitment to synapses.

    • Karl E. Bauer
    • , Inmaculada Segura
    •  & Michael A. Kiebler

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The authors use a forward genetic screen to discover postsynaptic factors required for homeostatic synaptic plasticity at the Drosophila neuromuscular junction. They identify insomniac and the ubiquitin ligase Cul3, genes involved in sleep regulation, to be necessary for retrograde homeostatic signalling at this synapse.

    • Koto Kikuma
    • , Xiling Li
    •  & Dion Dickman

  • Article
    | Open Access

    How astrocytes influence neuronal plasticity remains unclear, as they are typically considered as modulators of core mechanisms driven by neuronal components. Here, authors show that Long-term depression (LTD) induction in the hippocampus triggers calcium signaling in the astrocyte and enhances SNARE-dependent astrocytic glutamate release, which is then responsible for the activation of postsynaptic NMDA receptors and synaptic depression.

    • Marta Navarrete
    • , María I. Cuartero
    •  & José A. Esteban

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Activation of Ca2+/calmodulin-dependent kinase II (CaMKII) in dendritic spines is a key step of long-term potentiation (LTP) induction, yet the exact biochemical steps of CaMKIIα activation in dendritic spines remained elusive. In this study, the authors developed a novel imaging approach to monitor CaM interactions CaMKIIα in cultured hippocampal neurons after uncaging of glutamate. This allowed the authors to model the kinetics of CaMKIIα activation in single dendritic spines.

    • Jui-Yun Chang
    • , Yoshihisa Nakahata
    •  & Ryohei Yasuda

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The red nucleus (RN) is a midbrain nucleus known to be involved in the fine control of limb movements, but its role in motor learning is unclear. Here, the authors identified a neuronal population within the red nucleus, co-expressing Vglut2, PV and C1Ql2, which undergoes training-dependent plasticity.

    • Giorgio Rizzi
    • , Mustafa Coban
    •  & Kelly R. Tan

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Lowered synaptic density is believed to occur in major depressive disorder and PTSD, possibly as an effect of stress. Here, the authors use positron emission tomography (PET) to measure levels of the synaptic marker SV2A and show that SV2A density is lower in those with more severe symptoms of depression.

    • Sophie E. Holmes
    • , Dustin Scheinost
    •  & Irina Esterlis

  • Article
    | Open Access

    To realize the potential of resistive RAM crossbar arrays as platforms for neuromorphic computing, reduced network-level energy consumption must be achieved. Here, the authors use a hardware/software co-design approach to realize reduced energy consumption during network training for the network.

    • Yuhan Shi
    • , Leon Nguyen
    •  & Duygu Kuzum

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Cognitive decline in Huntington’s disease (HD) may be due to impaired hippocampal synaptic plasticity. In this study the authors show that AMPA receptor surface diffusion, a key player in synaptic plasticity, is deregulated in multiple HD mouse models as a result of impaired BDNF signalling that underlies the memory deficits, and can be pharmacologically rescued.

    • Hongyu Zhang
    • , Chunlei Zhang
    •  & Daniel Choquet

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The function of receptor desensitization in vivo is not well understood. Here, the authors show that deletion of CKAMP44, an AMPAR auxiliary protein that modulates desensitization of AMPAR currents, affects synaptic facilitation at retinogeniculate synapses and visually-evoked firing in awake mice.

    • Xufeng Chen
    • , Muhammad Aslam
    •  & Jakob von Engelhardt

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Dysfunction of mGluR5 has been implicated in Fragile X syndrome. Here, using a single-molecule tracking technique, the authors found an increased lateral mobility of mGluR5 at the synaptic site in Fmr1 KO hippocampal neurons, leading to abnormal NMDAR-mediated synaptic plasticity and cognitive deficits.

    • Elisabetta Aloisi
    • , Katy Le Corf
    •  & Andreas Frick

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Synaptic plasticity is the neuronal mechanism underlying learning. Here the authors construct biophysical models of pyramidal neurons that reproduce observed plasticity gradients along the dendrite and show that dendritic spike dependent LTP which is predominant in distal sections can prolong memory retention.

    • Jacopo Bono
    •  & Claudia Clopath

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Slow oscillations between cortical Up and Down states are a defining feature of deep sleep, but their function is not well understood. Here the authors study Up/Down states in acute slices of entorhinal cortex, and find that Up states promote the weakening of subthreshold synaptic inputs, while suprathreshold inputs are preserved or strengthened.

    • Julian Bartram
    • , Martin C. Kahn
    •  & Edward O. Mann

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