Temporal and Spatial Differential Expression of Glutamate Receptor Genes in the Brain of Down Syndrome

Abstract

Studying the dysregulation of expression of glutamate receptors is crucial to better understand the mechanisms associated with cognitive disabilities in Down syndrome (DS) patients. By using data of microarray experiments previously deposited in GEO Dataset, we studied the expression of 26 glutamate receptor genes in DS brain samples since prenatal to adult age in several brain structures. Overall, our results showed a complexity in the expression of the genes which were dependent mainly on the brain structure analyzed; especially, the hippocampus showed a different expression pattern. While in the general brain analysis the overexpressed genes were GRIN3A and GRIN2C, higher expression levels of GRM1, GRID2, and GRIK1 gene receptors were recorded in hippocampus. Our results suggest that the glutamatergic system in association with other neurotransmitter systems in the human brain would associate with glutamatergic receptor alterations to bring upon synaptic changes and cognitive deficits in DS models.