Environmental enrichment results in cortical and subcortical changes in levels of synaptophysin and PSD-95 proteins

Nithianantharajah, Jess; Levis, Hannah J.; Murphy, Mark

doi:10.1016/j.nlm.2004.02.002

Cited by 169 publications

(132 citation statements)

References 65 publications

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“…4A-B), similar to previous reports using adult rodents (Tang et al, 2001;Nithianantharajah et al, 2004;Naka et al, 2005). Consistent with the observed increases in the protein levels of both NMDA and AMPA receptors, the AMPA to NMDA ratio of evoked synaptic responses remained unchanged Figure 2.…”

Section: Postnatal Ee Rearing Enhances Glutamatergic Neurotransmissionsupporting

confidence: 90%

Early Enriched Environment Promotes Neonatal GABAergic Neurotransmission and Accelerates Synapse Maturation

He¹,

Ma²,

Liu³

et al. 2010

Journal of Neuroscience

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Environmental stimulation is critical for brain development. Here, we report that natural stimulation through enriched environment (EE) rearing during the first 2 weeks of mouse postnatal development promotes GABAergic neurotransmission and accelerates maturation of GABAergic and glutamatergic synapses. Using whole-cell recordings from CA1 pyramidal neurons in acute hippocampal slices, we found that EE-reared mice exhibited higher amplitude of miniature GABAergic postsynaptic currents (mGPSCs) at 1 week of postnatal development, as well as accelerated transition of GABA action from excitation to inhibition, compared with mice reared under standard housing conditions. This enhanced GABAergic synaptic transmission persisted until the end of the second postnatal week, when GABA mostly acts as an inhibitory neurotransmitter. Consistent with these electrophysiological results, we observed elevated levels of GABA A receptors and the K ϩ -Cl Ϫ cotransporter KCC2. Similarly, increased levels of excitatory synaptic components, including NMDA and AMPA receptors and the scaffolding protein PSD95, were detected in synaptosomal fractions from the forebrain/hippocampus of EEreared mice during the first two postnatal weeks. Functional increase in glutamatergic synaptic transmission, as measured by increased amplitude of miniature and spontaneous EPSCs, was also detected during the second postnatal week. Together, these results demonstrate that early environmental stimulation through EE rearing enhances early postnatal GABAergic neurotransmission, which is known to play important trophic functions in many aspects of neural development.

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Section: Postnatal Ee Rearing Enhances Glutamatergic Neurotransmissionsupporting

confidence: 90%

Early Enriched Environment Promotes Neonatal GABAergic Neurotransmission and Accelerates Synapse Maturation

He¹,

Ma²,

Liu³

et al. 2010

Journal of Neuroscience

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“…Our studies suggest environmental enrichment induces relatively widespread changes in the brain (Nithianantharajah et al 2004), including effects on FTL expression at the start of enrichment (Ali et al 2009). Given that environmental enrichment results in decreased stress levels and stress has long been known to increase c-fos expression (Pezzone et al 1992;Smith et al 1992), environmental enrichment over a period of weeks may result in generally decreased c-fos expression in the brain.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 68%

Tracking the fear memory engram: discrete populations of neurons within amygdala, hypothalamus, and lateral septum are specifically activated by auditory fear conditioning

et al. 2015

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Memory formation is thought to occur via enhanced synaptic connectivity between populations of neurons in the brain. However, it has been difficult to localize and identify the neurons that are directly involved in the formation of any specific memory. We have previously used fos-tau-lacZ (FTL) transgenic mice to identify discrete populations of neurons in amygdala and hypothalamus, which were specifically activated by fear conditioning to a context. Here we have examined neuronal activation due to fear conditioning to a more specific auditory cue. Discrete populations of learning-specific neurons were identified in only a small number of locations in the brain, including those previously found to be activated in amygdala and hypothalamus by context fear conditioning. These populations, each containing only a relatively small number of neurons, may be directly involved in fear learning and memory.

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“…EE-induced neurogenesis may have enhanced the effect on learning and memory that was observed after 8-OH-DPAT. Increased expression of the synaptic proteins synaptophysin and PSD-95 [70], enhanced dendritic growth [58], and increased progenitor cell survival [30] may also contribute to the enhanced benefits by promoting plasticity-associated changes in learning and memory. The observed attenuation of hippocampal CA 3 cells in both the 8-OH-DPAT and EE treated groups suggests that neuroprotection may have also played a role in the observed benefits.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Acute treatment with the 5-HT1A receptor agonist 8-OH-DPAT and chronic environmental enrichment confer neurobehavioral benefit after experimental brain trauma

Kline

Wagner

Westergom

et al. 2007

Behavioural Brain Research

100

166

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Acute treatment with the 5-HT 1A receptor agonist 8-hydroxy-2-(di-n-propylamino)tetralin (8-OH-DPAT) or chronic environmental enrichment (EE) hasten behavioral recovery after experimental traumatic brain injury (TBI). The aim of this study was to determine if combining these interventions would confer additional benefit. Anesthetized adult male rats received either a cortical impact or sham injury followed 15 min later by a single intraperitoneal injection of 8-OH-DPAT (0.5 mg/kg) or saline vehicle (1.0 mL/kg) and then randomly assigned to either enriched or standard (STD) housing. Behavioral assessments were conducted utilizing established motor and cognitive tests on post-injury days 1-5 and 14-18, respectively. Hippocampal CA 1 /CA 3 neurons were quantified at 3 weeks. Both 8-OH-DPAT and EE attenuated CA 3 cell loss. 8-OH-DPAT enhanced spatial learning in a Morris water maze (MWM) as revealed by differences between the TBI+8-OH-DPAT+STD and TBI+VEHICLE+STD groups (P=0.0014). EE improved motor function as demonstrated by reduced time to traverse an elevated narrow beam in both the TBI+8-OH-DPAT+EE and TBI+VEHICLE +EE groups vs. the TBI+VEHICLE+STD group (P=0.0007 and P=0.0016, respectively). EE also facilitated MWM learning as evidenced by both the TBI+8-OH-DPAT+EE and TBI+VEHICLE+EE groups locating the escape platform quicker than the TBI+VEHICLE+STD group (P's<0.0001). MWM differences were also observed between the TBI+8-OH-DPAT+EE and TBI+8-OH-DPAT +STD groups (P=0.0004) suggesting that EE enhanced the effect of 8-OH-DPAT. However, there was no difference between the TBI+8-OH-DPAT+EE and TBI+VEHICLE+EE groups. These data replicate previous results from our laboratory showing that both a single systemic administration of 8-OH-DPAT and EE improve recovery after TBI and extend those findings by elucidating that the combination of treatments in this particular paradigm did not confer additional benefit. One explanation for the lack of an additive effect is that EE is a very effective treatment and thus there is very little room for 8-OH-DPAT to confer additional statistically significant improvement.

show abstract

Environmental enrichment results in cortical and subcortical changes in levels of synaptophysin and PSD-95 proteins

Cited by 169 publications

References 65 publications

Early Enriched Environment Promotes Neonatal GABAergic Neurotransmission and Accelerates Synapse Maturation

Early Enriched Environment Promotes Neonatal GABAergic Neurotransmission and Accelerates Synapse Maturation

Tracking the fear memory engram: discrete populations of neurons within amygdala, hypothalamus, and lateral septum are specifically activated by auditory fear conditioning

Acute treatment with the 5-HT1A receptor agonist 8-OH-DPAT and chronic environmental enrichment confer neurobehavioral benefit after experimental brain trauma

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