A longstanding issue in environmental health is the need to understand the role the environment plays in human brain development. The brain of the neonate is particularly susceptible to disruption of the sensory environment, which can have profound effects on its physiology and morphology. Such susceptibility of the developing brain to environmental influence by sensory manipulation or to environmental toxicants is particularly pronounced during defined critical periods of postnatal life. On the one hand, this susceptibility makes the developing brain particularly vulnerable to toxic insults. On the other hand, the plasticity of the connections between neurons, or synapses, is critical for refining brain circuitry during postnatal development. Similar mechanisms for changing synapses are likely to serve the basis for learning in the adult. Our primary interest, therefore, has been to determine the molecular basis of long-lasting synaptic plasticity. Toward our goal of learning how neuronal activity can induce lasting modifications in neurons, we use a diverse collection of molecular, biochemical, electrophysiological, and imaging techniques. We primarily use the hippocampal slice preparation using neonate and adult rats and mice. The relatively simple laminar structure of the hippocampus, which itself plays an important role in learning and memory, allows electrophysiological studies to be performed easily. To measure synaptic responses, we use techniques that include whole-cell patch clamp recordings and field potential recordings from acutely prepared hippocampal slices maintained in vitro. Slice-cultures grown on multielectrode arrays allow for extracellular stimulating and recording during two-photon confocal fluorescent microscopy. To determine how transcription is regulated by neuronal activity, we use molecular and biochemical methods with acutely dissociated hippocampal and cortical neuronal cell cultures, which can be stimulated pharmacologically to mimic LTP and LTD. To understand how synaptic changes persist for up to a lifetime, we study how neuronal activity regulates gene transcription to consolidate synaptic changes. Evidence suggests that the long-term changes in synaptic efficacy require expression of new RNA and toward that end, we have focused on the regulation of gene transcription by neuronal action potentials. Previously, we have shown that action potentials generated with certain frequencies of synaptic stimulation (5 and 100 Hz) are more sensitive to NMDA receptor blockers than those induced with a theta-burst pattern of stimulation. This difference in sensitivity explained how kinase activation, as assessed by staining for an antibody against the phosphorylated and therefore activated extracellular signal-regulated kinase (ERK), is blocked in the 5 and 100 Hz cases, but not the theta-burst stimulation, by the same concentrations of NMDA receptor inhibitors that block the action potentials. The staining could be rescued if action potentials are restored with a blocker of inhibitory synapses. We have now found similar results with the activation of several transcription factors and transcription of an activity-regulated gene, arc/arg3.1 (induction was NMDA receptor independent, provided that action potentials were preserved). These findings have important implications for the interpretation of experiments using NMDA receptor inhibitors to conclude that signals to the nucleus come from the synapse. These results support our idea that action potentials are critical to the transcription of some genes under physiological conditions and will lead to a better understanding of how genes required for the consolidation of synaptic plasticity are regulated. Some insights into synaptic plasticity might be gained by comparing highly plastic brain areas, such as the CA1 area of hippocampus, with less plastic areas, such as layer 4 of the cerebral cortex. The hippocampus is critical for memory and spatial navigation. One area of the hippocampus, the CA2, however, shares with layer 4 expression of several of genes (TREK-1, a potassium channel, for example), and so we hypothesized that it would share with layer 4 neurons features such as a resistance to synaptic plasticity. The CA2, incidentally, has been noted for its resistance to disease and damage from trauma, ischemia, and stroke. As predicted, we discovered that CA2 is similarly resistant to forms of synaptic plasticity including synapse strengthening (long-term potentiation, LTP) and synaptic weakening (long-term depression, LTD), even though synaptic responses in CA2 were very similar to those in the neighboring CA1 and CA3 areas. Because LTP requires postsynaptic calcium for its induction, a first step in assessing how CA2 differs from its neighboring subfields was to test whether comparable levels of free calcium could be achieved in CA2 neurons in response to action potential generation. Using 2-photon laser scanning microscopy and whole-cell recordings of hippocampal neurons in slices, we found that dendritic spines in CA2 have very different calcium dynamics from spines in CA1 and CA3. Both calcium buffering capacity and rates of calcium extrusion were higher in CA2 spines when compared with those in the neighboring regions. When calcium extrusion was disrupted by inhibition of the plasma membrane calcium ATPase, LTP was restored. These data indicate that in spite of the multitude of other potential negative modulators of plasticity concentrated in CA2, blockade of calcium extrusion alone was sufficient to restore it. Because CA2 and its surrounding regions are anatomically very similar, these findings may therefore lead to identification of critical molecular components in the pathways leading to not only synaptic plasticity, but also neuronal damage and death. Using information we learn from CA2, we aim to determine the nature of the developmental down-regulation of synaptic plasticity in the form of critical periods. Our longer term goal is to determine how neuronal activity leads to synapse elimination (pruning). We have now developed a technique by which activity-dependent synapse elimination during critical periods can be studied in live tissue. We found that electrical stimulation that results in LTD is accompanied by loss of synaptic connections and that smaller synaptic contacts were most likely to be eliminated. This method will allow us to test our ideas on the molecular mechanisms allowing LTD to lead to synaptic loss. By understanding the molecular and cellular mechanisms of synaptic plasticity during development, we may begin to understand how exposure to environmental toxicants during development can have life-long consequences on cognition and susceptibility to diseases such as autism, schizophrenia, and Alzheimers disease.
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