Note to users. If you're seeing this message, it means that your browser cannot find this page's style/presentation instructions -- or possibly that you are using a browser that does not support current Web standards. Find out more about why this message is appearing, and what you can do to make your experience of our site the best it can be.

Site Tools

  • AAAS
  • Subscribe
  • Feedback

Site Search

Search Advanced

Science 11 April 2008:
Vol. 320. no. 5873, pp. 201 - 205
DOI: 10.1126/science.1152089
Prev | Table of Contents | Next

Research Articles

Surface Mobility of Postsynaptic AMPARs Tunes Synaptic Transmission

Martin Heine,1* Laurent Groc,1 Renato Frischknecht,4 Jean-Claude Béïque,3 Brahim Lounis,2 Gavin Rumbaugh,3 Richard L. Huganir,3 Laurent Cognet,2 Daniel Choquet1{dagger}

AMPA glutamate receptors (AMPARs) mediate fast excitatory synaptic transmission. Upon fast consecutive synaptic stimulation, transmission can be depressed. Recuperation from fast synaptic depression has been attributed solely to recovery of transmitter release and/or AMPAR desensitization. We show that AMPAR lateral diffusion, observed in both intact hippocampi and cultured neurons, allows fast exchange of desensitized receptors with naïve functional ones within or near the postsynaptic density. Recovery from depression in the tens of millisecond time range can be explained in part by this fast receptor exchange. Preventing AMPAR surface movements through cross-linking, endogenous clustering, or calcium rise all slow recovery from depression. Physiological regulation of postsynaptic receptor mobility affects the fidelity of synaptic transmission by shaping the frequency dependence of synaptic responses.

1 CNRS, UMR 5091, Université Bordeaux, Bordeaux, France.
2 Centre de Physique Moleculaire Optique et Hertzienne, CNRS, UMR 5798, Université Bordeaux, Talence, France.
3 Department of Neuroscience, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD, USA.
4 Leibniz Institut für Neurobiologie, Magdeburg, Germany.

* Present address: Leibniz Institut für Neurobiologie, Magdeburg, Germany.

{dagger} To whom correspondence should be addressed: dchoquet{at}u-bordeaux2.fr

Read the Full Text

ADVERTISEMENT
Click Me!

ADVERTISEMENT

To Advertise     Find Products

Science. ISSN 0036-8075 (print), 1095-9203 (online)