Synaptic plasticity articles within Nature Communications

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  • Article
    | Open Access

    Spike timing dependent plasticity (STDP) has been studied extensively in slices but whether such pairings can induce plasticity in vivo is not known. Here the authors report an experimental paradigm that achieves bidirectional corticostriatal STDP in vivo through modulation by behaviourally relevant reinforcement signals, mediated by dopamine and adenosine signaling.

    • Simon D. Fisher
    • , Paul B. Robertson
    •  & John N.J. Reynolds

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Proper brain function depends on the correct assembly of excitatory and inhibitory neurons into neural circuits. Here the authors show that during early postnatal development in mice, NMDAR signaling via activity of long-range synaptic inputs onto neurogliaform cells is required for their appropriate integration into the hippocampal circuitry.

    • R. Chittajallu
    • , J. C. Wester
    •  & C. J. McBain

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The role of TRPV1 in the CNS is not fully understood. Here the authors show that TRPV1 is expressed specifically in somatostatin-positive OLM interneurons of the hippocampus, where it promotes excitatory innervation of these cells.

    • Joaquin I. Hurtado-Zavala
    • , Binu Ramachandran
    •  & Camin Dean

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Mitoflashes are dynamic events in mitochondria, associated with depolarization and release of reactive oxygen species, and have been associated with several cellular functions. The authors now show that in neurons, dendritic mitoflashes are involved in structural postsynaptic changes during LTP.

    • Zhong-Xiao Fu
    • , Xiao Tan
    •  & Guo-Qiang Bi

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Emerging evidence suggests that spontaneous neurotransmitter release contributes to the maintenance of synaptic efficacy. Here the authors selectively reduce spontaneous glutamatergic transmission while leaving the stimulus-evoked responses intact and show that this leads to homeostatic scaling at the postsynaptic side in cultured neurons and alters synaptic plasticity in acute brain slices.

    • Devon C. Crawford
    • , Denise M. O. Ramirez
    •  & Ege T. Kavalali

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Astrocytes regulate synaptic signalling via EAAT glutamate uptake, though whether they play a role in Hebbian plasticity is unknown. Here, the authors find targeting EAAT2 disrupts the emergence of spike timing-dependent plasticity, which highlights the role of astrocytes as gatekeepers for Hebbian plasticity.

    • Silvana Valtcheva
    •  & Laurent Venance

  • Article
    | Open Access

    mGluRs are known to undergo non-canonical signalling regulation, although the underlying mechanisms are unclear. Here, the authors identify a role for β-arrestin2, but not β-arrestin1, in group I mGluR-mediated plasticity at hippocampal synapses.

    • Andrew G. Eng
    • , Daniel A. Kelver
    •  & Geoffrey T. Swanson

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Nicotinic acetylcholine receptors (nAChRs) are differentially expressed across cortical layers, yet it is unclear whether they show layer-specific effects on synaptic plasticity in the prefrontal cortex. Here, the authors compare nAChRs across L6 and L2/3 in human and mouse cortex and find they mediate opposite effects on synaptic plasticity.

    • Matthijs B. Verhoog
    • , Joshua Obermayer
    •  & Huibert D. Mansvelder

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Sleep deprivation is believed to lead to homeostatic increases in synaptic strength and reduced inducibility of associative LTP, based mainly on findings from animal studies. Here, Kuhn et al. demonstrate similar sleep-dependent synaptic plasticity changes in humans along with altered plasma BDNF levels.

    • Marion Kuhn
    • , Elias Wolf
    •  & Christoph Nissen

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Place cells in hippocampus encode a map of space, however the role of activity in place map stability is not known. Schoenenberger and colleagues optogenetically manipulate hippocampal firing rates within place fields and show lasting changes in spatial firing patterns through two separate mechanisms.

    • Philipp Schoenenberger
    • , Joseph O’Neill
    •  & Jozsef Csicsvari

  • Article
    | Open Access

    STDP is dependent on the timing of pre- and post-synaptic activity. Here, the authors describe a symmetric STDP induction rule at CA3-CA3 synapses, which induces LTP over a broad range of paring intervals. Modelling suggests that this STDP rule may enhance storage capacity and pattern completion in the CA3 cell network.

    • Rajiv K. Mishra
    • , Sooyun Kim
    •  & Peter Jonas

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The extent to which non-cerebellar pathways can refine motor performance is debated. Here, the authors demonstrate behaviourally relevant patterns of activation evoke rapid plasticity within direct and indirect vestibulo-ocular reflex pathways in vivo, leading to changes in evoked eye movements.

    • Diana E. Mitchell
    • , Charles C. Della Santina
    •  & Kathleen E. Cullen

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Humans are often biased in estimating the precise influence of probabilistic events on their decisions. Here, Khorsand and colleagues report a behavioural task that produces these biases in inference and describe a biophysically-plausible model that captures these behavioural deviations from optimal decision making.

    • Alireza Soltani
    • , Peyman Khorsand
    •  & Janet Liu

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Inputs to functionally related synapses have been suggested to show cooperative summation, although the rules governing these interactions are unclear. Here, Weber et al. uncover non-linear interactions dependent on NMDAR signalling that vary across the proximal-distal axis of individual dendrites.

    • Jens P. Weber
    • , Bertalan K. Andrásfalvy
    •  & Judit K. Makara

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Immature dentate gyrus neurons are highly excitable and are thought to be more responsive to afferent activity than mature neurons. Here, the authors find stimulation of the entorhinal cortex paradoxically generates spiking in mature rather than immature neurons due to low synaptic connectivity of immature cells.

    • Cristina V. Dieni
    • , Roberto Panichi
    •  & Linda Overstreet-Wadiche

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Microglia play key roles during early neurodevelopment. Here the authors show that microglia are important mediators of ocular dominance plasticity (ODP). Microglia respond to monocular deprivation during the visual critical period, and disrupting microglial P2Y12 purinergic receptor abrogates ODP.

    • G. O. Sipe
    • , R. L. Lowery,
    •  & A. K. Majewska

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The orbitofrontal cortex is associated with foraging behaviour yet the structural changes underlying such rule-based learning remain unclear. Here, the authors imaged OFC axons throughout a digging-based odour discrimination task and found correlations between the rate of bouton turnover and the behavioural strategies of individual mice.

    • Carolyn M. Johnson
    • , Hannah Peckler
    •  & Linda Wilbrecht

  • Article
    | Open Access

    New olfactory sensory neurons (OSNs) wire into olfactory bulb circuits throughout life. Here, the authors show that newly generated OSNs form highly dynamics synapses and can elicit functional responses in OB neurons, while mature OSNs retain a high level of activity-dependent synaptic reorganisation.

    • Claire E. J. Cheetham
    • , Una Park
    •  & Leonardo Belluscio

  • Article
    | Open Access

    During STDP, the magnitude of postsynaptic Ca2+transients is hypothesized to determine the strength of synaptic plasticity. Here, the authors find that STDP in mature hippocampal synapses does not obey this rule but instead relies on the coordinated activation of NMDARs and VGCCs and their regulation by mGluRs and SK channels.

    • Cezar M. Tigaret
    • , Valeria Olivo
    •  & Jack R. Mellor

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS) is widely used as a therapeutic tool yet its effect on inhibitory networks in the brain has not been studied. Here, the authors demonstrate that 10Hz rTMS specifically reduces dendritic inhibition onto pyramidal neurons accompanied by remodeling of postsynaptic gephyrin clusters.

    • Maximilian Lenz
    • , Christos Galanis
    •  & Andreas Vlachos

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Alzheimer's disease is linked to metabolic syndrome and Type-2 diabetes, but the mechanism behind this association is unclear. Here, the authors show that elevated glucose and amyloid ß work together to increase nitrosative stress, leading to aberrant mitochondrial activity and synaptic dysfunction.

    • Mohd Waseem Akhtar
    • , Sara Sanz-Blasco
    •  & Stuart A. Lipton

  • Article
    | Open Access

    GluA2-lacking AMPA receptors are known to play a role in homeostatic plasticity. Here, the authors show that spiking activity blockade disinhibits mir124 transcription, which in turn suppresses GluA2 mRNA translation, thereby contributing to synaptic upscaling in hippocampal cells.

    • Qingming Hou
    • , Hongyu Ruan
    •  & Heng-Ye Man

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Dendritic spines located on individual neurons process information, but our understanding of the electrical behaviour of spines is still limited. Here, the authors use voltage-sensitive dye imaging techniques to monitor electrical signals from thin basal spines and show that synapses are not electrically isolated by the spine neck.

    • Marko A. Popovic
    • , Nicholas Carnevale
    •  & Dejan Zecevic

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The brain exhibits a diversity of plasticity mechanisms across different timecales that constitute the putative basis for learning and memory. Here, the authors demonstrate how these different plasticity mechanisms are orchestrated to support the formation of robust and stable neural cell assemblies.

    • Friedemann Zenke
    • , Everton J. Agnes
    •  & Wulfram Gerstner

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Lateral diffusion of receptors between synaptic and extrasynaptic sites is known to mediate plasticity. Hausrat et al. show that diffusion of α5-containing GABAAreceptors is controlled by phosphorylation of the extrasynaptic anchoring protein Radixin, and reveal a role for Radixin in learning and memory.

    • Torben J. Hausrat
    • , Mary Muhia
    •  & Matthias Kneussel

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Long-term potentiation (LTP) is a form of synaptic plasticity that results in enhanced synaptic strength. Here, the authors demonstrate that miR-26a and miR-384-5p affect the maintenance, but not induction, of LTP as well as spine enlargement by regulating the expression of RSK3.

    • Qin-Hua Gu
    • , Danni Yu
    •  & Zheng Li

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Synaptic upscaling is characterized by an increase in the strength of excitatory inputs to a neuron as a compensatory response to chronic reductions in spiking activity. Here, the authors demonstrate that reduced glutamatergic transmission, rather than reduced spiking activity, directly triggers upscaling.

    • Ming-fai Fong
    • , Jonathan P. Newman
    •  & Peter Wenner

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Reproduction in mammals is dependent on the function of specific neurons that secrete gonadotropin-releasing hormone (GnRH) and project their axons to the median eminence (ME) of the hypothalamus. Here the authors show that Semaphorin7A signaling plays a role in mediating the plasticity of GnRH axon terminals and tanycytes in the ME.

    • Jyoti Parkash
    • , Andrea Messina
    •  & Paolo Giacobini

  • Article |

    In response to spinal cord injuries, limited functional recovery can be achieved but the new circuits that arise have not been characterized in detail. Here the authors show that synaptic connections between the ascending proprioceptive neurons and a small number of spared dorsal column neurons, can be remodeled after a cervical lesion to support functional recovery.

    • Edmund R. Hollis II
    • , Nao Ishiko
    •  & Yimin Zou

  • Article |

    Connectivity patterns between neurons in the brain store recent sensory experiences, but how these patterns form is unclear. Here, the authors provide a model describing the process through which synaptic plasticity combined with homeostatic mechanisms allow stable neuronal assemblies to form.

    • Ashok Litwin-Kumar
    •  & Brent Doiron

  • Article |

    Electrical synaptic transmission is known to be modulated by intracellular magnesium. Here, Palacios-Prado et al.show that electrical synapses formed by connexin36 in the thalamic reticular nucleus are bidirectionally modulated by changes in magnesium concentration via pore-lining sensitive domains.

    • Nicolás Palacios-Prado
    • , Sandrine Chapuis
    •  & Feliksas F. Bukauskas

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Perineuronal astrocyte reactivity is implicated in functional recovery following nerve injury but exactly how this happens is unclear. Tyzack et al. show that perineuronal astrocytes facilitate the recovery of synaptic inputs to damaged neurons via STAT3-dependent upregulation of the astrocytic protein TSP-1.

    • Giulia E. Tyzack
    • , Sergey Sitnikov
    •  & András Lakatos

  • Article
    | Open Access

    GABA receptors are implicated in neuronal postsynaptic long-term potentiation of inhibition (iLTP). Here, Petrini et al. show that iLTP depends on recruitment of the scaffold protein gephyrin at synapses, which is enhanced by CaMKII-dependent phosphorylation of a specific residue on GABAAreceptors.

    • Enrica Maria Petrini
    • , Tiziana Ravasenga
    •  & Andrea Barberis

  • Article
    | Open Access

    In Alzheimer's disease, the soluble amyloid beta peptide is known to modulate synaptic function by forming a complex with prion proteins and metabotropic glutamate receptors. Here, Hu et al.show that amyloid beta signalling via this complex facilitates the induction of long-term depression at synapses.

    • Neng-Wei Hu
    • , Andrew J. Nicoll
    •  & Michael J. Rowan

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