Search results for "CELLULAR AND MOLECULAR NEUROSCIENCE"
showing 10 items of 1370 documents
Maternal inflammation has a profound effect on cortical interneuron development in a stage and subtype-specific manner
2018
AbstractSevere infections during pregnancy are one of the major risk factors for cognitive impairment in the offspring. It has been suggested that maternal inflammation leads to dysfunction of cortical GABAergic interneurons that in turn underlies cognitive impairment of the affected offspring. However, the evidence comes largely from studies of adult or mature brains and how the impairment of inhibitory circuits arises upon maternal inflammation is unknown. Here we show that maternal inflammation affects multiple steps of cortical GABAergic interneuron development, i.e., proliferation of precursor cells, migration and positioning of neuroblasts, as well as neuronal maturation. Importantly,…
Elevated Regulatory T Cell Levels in Glaucoma Patients in Comparison to Healthy Controls.
2016
Many studies analyzing neurodegenerative diseases demonstrate altered frequencies of regulatory T cells (Tregs). Till date, there is hardly any information concerning Tregs in glaucoma. To gather first results concerning Treg levels in glaucoma patients, we aimed to investigate whether the number of CD4(+)CD25(+)T cells vary in the patients suffering from primary open-angle glaucoma (POAG) and healthy controls.Heparinized blood samples were collected from 16 healthy individuals and 16 POAG patients. The groups were age and gender matched. A density gradient centrifugation over Ficoll-Paque was performed to isolate the peripheral blood mononuclear cells. The resulting cells were stained with…
NKCC1-Mediated GABAergic Signaling Promotes Postnatal Cell Death in Neocortical Cajal-Retzius Cells.
2016
During early development, a substantial proportion of central neurons undergoes programmed cell death. This activity-dependent process is essential for the proper structural and functional development of the brain. To uncover cell type-specific differences in the regulation of neuronal survival versus apoptosis, we studied activity-regulated cell death in Cajal-Retzius neurons (CRNs) and the overall neuronal population in the developing mouse cerebral cortex. CRNs in the upper neocortical layer represent an early-born neuronal population, which is important for cortical development and largely disappears by apoptosis during neonatal stages. In contrast to the overall neuronal population, ac…
Cannabinoid CB1 receptors in distinct circuits of the extended amygdala determine fear responsiveness to unpredictable threat.
2016
The brain circuits underlying behavioral fear have been extensively studied over the last decades. Although the vast majority of experimental studies assess fear as a transient state of apprehension in response to a discrete threat, such phasic states of fear can shift to a sustained anxious apprehension, particularly in face of diffuse cues with unpredictable environmental contingencies. Unpredictability, in turn, is considered an important variable contributing to anxiety disorders. The networks of the extended amygdala have been suggested keys to the control of phasic and sustained states of fear, although the underlying synaptic pathways and mechanisms remain poorly understood. Here, we…
GLRB allelic variation associated with agoraphobic cognitions, increased startle response and fear network activation: a potential neurogenetic pathw…
2017
Contains fulltext : 177350.pdf (Publisher’s version ) (Closed access) The molecular genetics of panic disorder (PD) with and without agoraphobia (AG) are still largely unknown and progress is hampered by small sample sizes. We therefore performed a genome-wide association study with a dimensional, PD/AG-related anxiety phenotype based on the Agoraphobia Cognition Questionnaire (ACQ) in a sample of 1370 healthy German volunteers of the CRC TRR58 MEGA study wave 1. A genome-wide significant association was found between ACQ and single non-coding nucleotide variants of the GLRB gene (rs78726293, P=3.3 x 10-8; rs191260602, P=3.9 x 10-8). We followed up on this finding in a larger dimensional AC…
Dimethyl fumarate treatment after traumatic brain injury prevents depletion of antioxidative brain glutathione and confers neuroprotection.
2017
Dimethyl fumarate (DMF) is an immunomodulatory compound to treat multiple sclerosis and psoriasis with neuroprotective potential. Its mechanism of action involves activation of the antioxidant pathway regulator Nuclear factor erythroid 2-related factor 2 thereby increasing synthesis of the cellular antioxidant glutathione (GSH). The objective of this study was to investigate whether post-traumatic DMF treatment is beneficial after experimental traumatic brain injury (TBI). Adult C57Bl/6 mice were subjected to controlled cortical impact followed by oral administration of DMF (80 mg/kg body weight) or vehicle at 3, 24, 48, and 72 h after the inflicted TBI. At 4 days after lesion (dal), DMF-tr…
Hyperammonemia alters the mismatch negativity in the auditory evoked potential by altering functional connectivity and neurotransmission
2020
Minimal hepatic encephalopathy (MHE) is a neuropsychiatric syndrome produced by central nervous system dysfunction subsequent to liver disease. Hyperammonemia and inflammation act synergistically to alter neurotransmission, leading to the cognitive and motor alterations in MHE, which are reproduced in rat models of chronic hyperammonemia. Patients with MHE show altered functional connectivity in different neural networks and a reduced response in the cognitive potential mismatch negativity (MMN), which correlates with attention deficits. The mechanisms by which MMN is altered in MHE remain unknown. The objectives of this work are as follows: To assess if rats with chronic hyperammonemia rep…
GABA-containing compound gammapyrone protects against brain impairments in Alzheimer's disease model male rats and prevents mitochondrial dysfunction…
2018
Neuroinflammation, oxidative stress, decreased glucose/energy metabolism, and disrupted neurotransmission are changes that occur early in sporadic Alzheimer's disease (AD), manifesting as mild cognitive impairment. Recently, the imbalanced function of the gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA) system was identified as a critical factor in AD progression. Thus, maintaining balance among neurotransmitter systems, particularly the GABA system, can be considered a beneficial strategy to slow AD progression. The present study investigated the effects of the compound gammapyrone, a molecule containing three GABA moieties: "free" moiety attached to the position 4 of the 1,4-dihydropyridine (DHP) ring, and…
Activation of MORs in the VTA induces changes on cFos expression in different projecting regions: Effect of inflammatory pain.
2019
Abstract Chronic pain is a worldwide major health problem and many pain-suffering patients are under opioid based therapy. Epidemiological data show that pain intensity correlates with the risk of misuse of prescription opioids, and other drugs of abuse including alcohol. This increased vulnerability to suffer Substance Use Disorders could be, in part, caused by functional changes that occur over the mesocorticolimbic system, a brain pathway involved in reward processing and addiction. Previous data in rats revealed that inflammatory pain desensitizes mu opioid receptors (MORs) in the ventral tegmental area (VTA). As a consequence, pain alters dopamine release in the nucleus accumbens (NAc)…
Lorcaserin bidirectionally regulates dopaminergic function site-dependently and disrupts dopamine brain area correlations in rats
2020
Abstract Lorcaserin, which is a selective agonist of serotonin2C receptors (5-HT2CRs), is a new FDA-approved anti-obesity drug that has also shown therapeutic promise in other brain disorders, such as addiction and epilepsy. The modulation of dopaminergic function might be critical in the therapeutic effect of lorcaserin, but its exact effect is unknown. Here, we studied the effect of the peripheral administration of lorcaserin on the ventral tegmental area (VTA), the substantia nigra pars compacta (SNc) dopaminergic neural activity, dopamine (DA) dialysis levels in the nucleus accumbens and striatum and on DA tissue levels in 29 different rat brain regions. Lorcaserin (5–640 μg/kg, i.v.) m…