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02/05/2006

"Nature Neuroscience" publishes an article by a researcher of the CIMA of the University of Navarra about neuronal connections

Dr. Isabel Pérez-Otaño and scientists from the U.S. describe a newly-discovered process, which is key to neuro-psychiatric disorders

The scientific journal Nature Neuroscience, of the Nature Group, has just published in its May issue an article by Dr. Isabel Pérez-Otaño, a researcher of the Center for Applied Medical Research (CIMA) of the University of Navarra. Along with colleagues from the Salk Institute (California) and Duke University (North Carolina), among others, she describes a newly-discovered process for modifying the functioning of synaptic connections. Synapses are microscopic structures which connect neurons to each other in order to form neural networks.

According to Dr. Pérez-Otaño, “synaptic alterations are produced in the brain in diseases such as Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s and other pathologies of development in children (autism, Down’s syndrome) and schizophrenia in adolescents.”

Since their discovery by Santiago Ramón y Cajal, “neurobiologists have advanced greatly in their knowledge of the molecules which form these structures, as well as of how the brain continually remodels them in order to form new synapses, strengthen those which already exist, or eliminate those which are unnecessary.”

Thinking, remembering and forgetting

The researcher from the CIMA explained that “this capacity for remodeling, known as ‘synaptic plasticity’, permits us to think, create new memories and forget insignificant details. If this process of remodeling does not function correctly, our brain begins to fail.”

In the article published in Nature Neuroscience, the group of scientists showed how “this process is in charge of the elimination of precisely selected components of the synapse: the NMDA receptors, molecules which encode the information stored during the development of the brain and during processes of learning and memorization, via the recruiting of a new molecule which interacts in a selective manner with the receptor.”

The authors predict that this mechanism, and others that are similar but as yet undiscovered, will be the key for “understanding how our brain decides which synapses must be eliminated in order to maintain the delicate balance that ensures normal function.” The team of Dr. Pérez-Otaño is currently researching at the CIMA whether this process of synaptic elimination is altered in brain disorders, and, if so, how it contributes to the development of symptoms. In the medium term, they intend to study possible therapeutic solutions.

Along with the researcher from the CIMA of the University of Navarra, the following authors also signed the article, with varying degrees of participation: Michael D. Ehlers and Donald C. Lo (Duke University), Steven J. Tavalin (University of Tennessee), Markus Plomann y Jan Modregger (University of Köln), Xiao-Bo Liu and Edward G. Jones (University of California, Davis), Stephen F. Heinemann (The Salk Institute, California) and Rafael Luján (University of Castilla-La Mancha).