This report covers a period of 6 months, up to 03/2015, when the Section of Model Synaptic Systems closed. The section chief, Dr. Fumihito Ono, left NIAAA on 03/27/2015 to become Professor and Chairman at the Department of Physiology, Osaka Medical College in Japan. Postdocs in the section also moved to their next position during this period. Dr. Tory Williams accepted the position of lecturer at the University of Maryland. Dr. Meghan Mott was awarded a fellowship for science policy at American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). Dr. Jee-Young Park was hired by a pharmaceutical company in South Korea. A review paper entitled Zebrafish mutants of the neuromuscular junction: Swimming in the gene pool was published in the Journal of Physiological Sciences. It provides an overview of zebrafish mutants with dysfunctional acetylcholine receptors or related proteins at the neuromuscular junction (NMJ). The NMJ, which has served as the classical model of the chemical synapse, uses acetylcholine as the neurotransmitter, and mutations of proteins involved in the signaling cascade lead to a variety of behavioral phenotypes. Mutants isolated after random chemical mutagenesis screening were summarized, and advances in the field resulting from these mutants were discussed in the review. In order to complete projects started at NIAAA, resources including established genetic lines were transferred to a new lab in Osaka. The results obtained from these projects will be published as soon as remaining experiments are completed.

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Project End
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Budget End
Support Year
9
Fiscal Year
2015
Total Cost
Indirect Cost
Name
Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism
Department
Type
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Daikoku, Eriko; Saito, Masahisa; Ono, Fumihito (2015) Zebrafish mutants of the neuromuscular junction: swimming in the gene pool. J Physiol Sci 65:217-21
Puhl 3rd, Henry L; Lu, Van B; Won, Yu-Jin et al. (2014) Ancient origins of RGK protein function: modulation of voltage-gated calcium channels preceded the protostome and deuterostome split. PLoS One 9:e100694
Fero, Kandice; Bergeron, Sadie A; Horstick, Eric J et al. (2014) Impaired embryonic motility in dusp27 mutants reveals a developmental defect in myofibril structure. Dis Model Mech 7:289-98
Park, Jee-Young; Mott, Meghan; Williams, Tory et al. (2014) A single mutation in the acetylcholine receptor ?-subunit causes distinct effects in two types of neuromuscular synapses. J Neurosci 34:10211-8
Ikeda, Hiromi; Delargy, Alison H; Yokogawa, Tohei et al. (2013) Intrinsic properties of larval zebrafish neurons in ethanol. PLoS One 8:e63318
Ono, Fumihito (2013) Big answers from a small fly with a cultured brain. J Physiol 591:3
Nakayama, Sohei; Ikenaga, Takanori; Kawakami, Koichi et al. (2012) Transgenic line with gal4 insertion useful to study morphogenesis of craniofacial perichondrium, vascular endothelium-associated cells, floor plate, and dorsal midline radial glia during zebrafish development. Dev Growth Differ 54:202-15
Papke, Roger L; Ono, Fumihito; Stokes, Clare et al. (2012) The nicotinic acetylcholine receptors of zebrafish and an evaluation of pharmacological tools used for their study. Biochem Pharmacol 84:352-65
Walogorsky, Michael; Mongeon, Rebecca; Wen, Hua et al. (2012) Zebrafish model for congenital myasthenic syndrome reveals mechanisms causal to developmental recovery. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A 109:17711-6
Won, Yu-Jin; Ono, Fumihito; Ikeda, Stephen R (2012) Characterization of Na+ and Ca2+ channels in zebrafish dorsal root ganglion neurons. PLoS One 7:e42602

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