The molecular fingerprint of stress resilience

Abstract

Stress resilience is an ability of neuronal networks to maintain their function despite the stress exposure. In this study, we investigate whether stress resilience is an actively developed dynamic process in adult mice. In order to assess the resilient and anhedonic behavioral phenotypes developed after induction the chronic unpredictable stress, we quantitatively characterized the structural and functional plasticity of excitatory synapses in the hippocampus using a combination of proteomic, electrophysiological, and imaging methods. Our results indicate that stress resilience is a dynamic and multifactorial process manifested by structural, functional, and molecular changes in synapses. We reveal that chronic stress influences palmitoylation, whose profiles differ between resilient and anhedonic animals. We also observed that stress resilience is associated with structural compensatory plasticity of the postsynaptic parts of synapses.