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Identification of disabled‐1 as a candidate gene for critical period neuroplasticity in cat and mouse visual cortex
Author(s) -
Yang Cui Bo,
Zheng Yu Ting,
Kiser Paul J.,
Mower George D.
Publication year - 2006
Publication title -
european journal of neuroscience
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.346
H-Index - 206
eISSN - 1460-9568
pISSN - 0953-816X
DOI - 10.1111/j.1460-9568.2006.04799.x
Subject(s) - visual cortex , neuroplasticity , period (music) , cortex (anatomy) , neuroscience , biology , reelin , cerebral cortex , cats , microbiology and biotechnology , medicine , physics , acoustics , extracellular matrix
Rearing in darkness slows the time course of the critical period in visual cortex, such that at 5 weeks of age normal cats are more plastic than dark‐reared cats, whereas at 20 weeks dark‐reared cats are more plastic [G. D. Mower (1991) Dev. Brain Res. , 58, 151–158]. Thus, a stringent criterion is that genes that are important for plasticity in visual cortex will show differences in expression between normal and dark‐reared visual cortex that are of opposite direction in young vs. older animals. The present study reports the identification by differential display PCR of Dab‐1 , the mammalian homolog of the drosophila disabled‐1 gene, as a candidate gene for critical period neuronal plasticity, expression of which is regulated according to this criterion in cat visual cortex. Evidence for this bidirectional direction regulation is extended to Dab‐1 protein in cat and mouse visual cortex and shown to be specific to visual cortex, not occurring in frontal cortex. The Reelin/Dab‐1 pathway has well‐documented functions in cell migration during prenatal life and increasing evidence indicates that in postnatal brain the pathway plays a role in synaptic plasticity. The present results extend this evidence by directly implicating Dab‐1 in postnatal critical period plasticity of visual cortex.