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Melatonin receptor expression exhibits profound developmental changes through poorly understood mechanisms. In mammals, a current model suggests that pubertal reactivation of gonadotrophin-releasing hormone (GnRH) secretion down-regulates MT1 melatonin receptors in pituitary gonadotroph cells, via the induction of early growth response factor-1 (EGR-1). Here we have examined this model by testing the hypotheses that inhibition of Mt1 expression by GnRH occurs directly in gonadotroph cells, can be reversed in adulthood by blockade of GnRH receptors, and requires EGR-1. We first confirmed the endogenous expression of Mt1 mRNA in the αT3-1 gonadotroph cell line. Stimulation of these cells with a GnRH agonist resulted in a rapid increase of Egr-1 mRNA expression, which peaked after 30–60 minutes, and a more prolonged elevation of nuclear EGR-1 immunoreactivity. Moreover, the GnRH agonist significantly decreased Mt1 mRNA. We then treated adult male rats with the GnRH antagonist cetrorelix or saline. After 4 weeks of daily injections, cetrorelix significantly reduced serum LH concentration and testis weight, with histological analysis confirming absence of spermatogenesis. Despite the successful inhibition of GnRH signalling, pituitary Mt1 expression was unchanged. Next we studied the proximal region of the rat Mt1 promoter. Consistent with previous work, over-expression of the transcription factor PITX-1 increased Mt1-luciferase reporter activity; this effect was dependent on the presence of consensus PITX-1 promoter binding regions. Over-expression of EGR-1 inhibited PITX-1-stimulated activity, even following mutation of the consensus EGR-1 binding site. Finally, we studied Egr1−/− mice and observed no difference in pituitary Mt1 expression between Egr1−/− and wild-type litter mates. This work demonstrates that GnRH receptor activation directly down-regulates Mt1 expression in gonadotroph cells. However, pituitary Mt1 expression in adults is unaltered by blockade of GnRH signalling or absence of EGR-1. Our data therefore suggest that melatonin receptor regulation by GnRH is not reversible in adulthood and doesn't require EGR-1. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Huntington's disease (HD) is characterized by triad of motor, cognitive, and emotional symptoms along with neuropathology in fronto-striatal circuit and limbic system including amygdala. Emotional alterations, which have a negative impact on patient well-being, represent some of the earliest symptoms of HD and might be related to the onset of the neurodegenerative process. In the transgenic rat model (tgHD rats), evidence suggest emotional alterations at the symptomatic stage along with neuropathology of the central nucleus of amygdala (CE). Studies in humans and animals demonstrate that emotion can modulate time perception. The impact of emotion on time perception has never been tested in HD, nor is it known if that impact could be part of the presymptomatic emotional phenotype of the pathology. The aim of this paper was to characterize the effect of emotion on temporal discrimination in presymptomatic tgHD animals. In the first experiment, we characterized the acute effect of an emotion (fear) conditioned stimulus on temporal discrimination using a bisection procedure, and tested its dependency upon an intact central amygdala. The second experiment was aimed at comparing presymptomatic homozygous transgenic animals at 7-months of age and their wild-type littermates (WT) in their performance on the modulation of temporal discrimination by emotion. Our principal findings show that (1) a fear cue produces a short-lived decrease of temporal precision after its termination, and (2) animals with medial CE lesion and presymptomatic tgHD animals demonstrate an alteration of this emotion-evoked temporal distortion. The results contribute to our knowledge about the presymptomatic phenotype of this HD rat model, showing susceptibility to emotion that may be related to dysfunction of the central nucleus of amygdala. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cognitive decline precedes motor symptoms in Huntington disease (HD). A transgenic rat model for HD carrying only 51 CAG repeats recapitulates the late-onset HD phenotype. Here, we assessed prefrontostriatal function in this model through both behavioral and electrophysiological assays. Behavioral examination consisted in a temporal bisection task within a supra-second range (2 vs.8 s), which is thought to involve prefrontostriatal networks. In two independent experiments, the behavioral analysis revealed poorer temporal sensitivity as early as 4 months of age, well before detection of overt motor deficits. At a later symptomatic age, animals were impaired in their temporal discriminative behavior. In vivo recording of field potentials in the dorsomedial striatum evoked by stimulation of the prelimbic cortex were studied in 4- to 5-month-old rats. Input/output curves, paired-pulse function, and plasticity induced by theta-burst stimulation (TBS) were assessed. Results showed an altered plasticity, with higher paired-pulse facilitation, enhanced short-term depression, as well as stronger long-term potentiation after TBS in homozygous transgenic rats. Results from the heterozygous animals mostly fell between wild-type and homozygous transgenic rats. Our results suggest that normal plasticity in prefrontostriatal circuits may be necessary for reliable and precise timing behavior. Furthermore, the present study provides the first behavioral and electrophysiological evidence of a presymptomatic alteration of prefrontostriatal processing in an animal model for Huntington disease and suggests that supra-second timing may be the earliest cognitive dysfunction in HD. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Adult neurogenesis is involved in certain hippocampus-dependent cognitive functions and is linked to psychiatric diseases including intellectual disabilities. The Coffin-Lowry syndrome (CLS) is a developmental disorder caused by mutations in the Rsk2 gene and characterized by intellectual disabilities associated with growth retardation. How RSK2-deficiency leads to cognitive dysfunctions in CLS is however poorly understood. Here, using Rsk2 Knock-Out mice, we characterized the impact of RSK2 deficiency on adult hippocampal neurogenesis in vivo . We report that the absence of RSK2 does not affect basal proliferation, differentiation and survival of dentate gyrus adult-born neurons but alters the maturation progression of young immature newborn neurons. Moreover, when RSK2-deficient mice were submitted to spatial learning, in contrast to wild-type mice, proliferation of adult generated neurons was decreased and no pro-survival effect of learning was observed. Thus, learning failed to recruit a selective population of young newborn neurons in association with deficient long-term memory recall. Given the proposed role of the dentate gyrus and of adult-generated newborn neurons in hippocampal-dependent pattern separation function, we explored this function in a delayed non-matching to place task and in an object-place pattern separation task and report severe deficits in spatial pattern separation in Rsk2 -KO mice. Together, this study reveals a previously unknown role for RSK2 in the early stages of maturation and learning-dependent involvement of adult-born dentate gyrus neurons. These alterations associated with a deficit in the ability of RSK2-deficient mice to finely discriminate relatively similar spatial configurations, may contribute to cognitive dysfunction in CLS. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD) is caused by the absence of dystrophin, a protein that fulfills important functions in both muscle and brain. The mdx mouse model of DMD, which also lacks dystrophin, shows a marked reduction in γ-aminobutyric acid type A (GABAA)-receptor clustering in central inhibitory synapses and enhanced long-term potentiation (LTP) at CA3–CA1 synapses of the hippocampus. We have recently shown that U7 small nuclear RNAs modified to encode antisense sequences and expressed from recombinant adeno-associated viral (rAAV) vectors are able to induce skipping of the mutated exon 23 and to rescue expression of a functional dystrophin-like product both in the muscle and nervous tissue in vivo. In the brain, this rescue was accompanied by restoration of both the size and number of hippocampal GABAA-receptor clustering. Here, we report that 25.2±8% of re-expression two months after intrahippocampal injection of rAAV reverses the abnormally enhanced LTP phenotype at CA3–CA1 synapses of mdx mice. These results suggests that dystrophin expression indirectly influences synaptic plasticity through modulation of GABAA-receptor clustering and that re-expression of the otherwise deficient protein in the adult can significantly alleviate alteration of neural functions in DMD. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]