2013 — 2017 |
Kim, Tae-Kyung |
R01Activity Code Description: To support a discrete, specified, circumscribed project to be performed by the named investigator(s) in an area representing his or her specific interest and competencies. |
The Epigenetic Mechanism of Enhancer Rna in Behavioral Plasticity @ Ut Southwestern Medical Center
DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): A substantial body of evidence suggests that many neurological diseases may commonly result from perturbations of activity-dependent changes in neural functions. During brain development, sensory stimulation-dependent modulation of individual neurons and circuits involves not only structural and functional changes in local synaptic connections, but also a cell-wide arrangement for sustained adaptive responses. Sensory experience-dependent gene expression is an integral mechanism of cell-wide adaptation as it is responsible for the stimulus-specific production and deployment of proteins with various functions in individual neurons, which are required for appropriate adaptive responses. In keeping with this notion, mutations in several genes implicated in the signaling pathways from the synapse to the nucleus have been linked to various neurological diseases such as autism and epilepsy, suggesting that the disruption of activity-dependent gene expression programs under specific circumstances, such as activity-dependent learning can elicit a pathophysiological condition. As such, the study to understand how genetic and epigenetic programs accurately translate sensory information into changes in relevant neural circuits and cognitive behavior bears clinical significance. A recent genome-wide study revealed that a novel class of long non-protein coding RNAs (lncRNAs) called eRNAs (enhancer RNAs) is rapidly expressed from thousands of neuronal enhancers when neurons are excited. The eRNA is quite unique among various types of lncRNAs in that its expression is rapid, transient, and dynamically controlled by sensory stimulation-evoked neuronal activity. The pervasive nature and strong expression correlation with nearby mRNAs suggest a provoking idea that the eRNA might be functionally implicated in the sensory stimulation-induced neural and behavioral plasticity by playing an active role in neural gene expression. Initial analysis of the eRNA function further supports this hypothesis. Given that less than 2% of the mammalian genome accounts for protein-coding genes, an increasing number of mutations associated with neurological diseases will be found to reside in the non-coding regions as human genetic studies continue to advance. The proposed study involves a multidisciplinary approach to examine the role of eRNA in activity-dependent transcription and subsequent changes in synaptic and behavioral plasticity. The eRNA-dependent epigenetic mechanism may represent a new layer of complexity in the molecular architecture of many neurological diseases.
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0.993 |
2014 — 2017 |
Kim, Tae-Kyung Meeks, Julian (co-PI) [⬀] Roberts, Todd [⬀] Konopka, Genevieve (co-PI) [⬀] |
N/AActivity Code Description: No activity code was retrieved: click on the grant title for more information |
Brain Eager: Tagging the Genetic, Synaptic, and Network Origins of Learning From Social Experiences @ University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center
How we learn from social experiences and during social interactions is poorly understood, but it is thought to involve intricate changes to nerve cells in the brain and the connections between these cells. Cells involved in social learning are intermingled and intertwined with cells that may have completely different functions. Because of this complexity, identifying and studying the specific cells and networks involved in social learning remain a major challenge, and new methods are required to address this needle-in-a-hay-stack problem. This research will build a new set of genetic tools that allow researchers to mark cells in the brains of mice and zebra finches that are specifically involved in learning during social interactions, and will apply cutting-edge imaging, physiological, and genetic methods to dissect how the marked cells change during learning. This research is of fundamental importance because it will shed light on the brain mechanisms involved in social learning and build a new set of genetic tools that can be used by the scientific community to study brain mechanisms involved in learning and memory. The research also is of importance because developmental disorders and head injuries can severely compromise circuits in the brain and individuals' ability to learn from social encounters and navigate complex social interactions. The tools and methodologies developed in this research will be made freely available to other scientists through the world-wide web (http://www.utsouthwestern.edu/education/medical-school/departments/neuroscience/index.html) and through the Addgene public repository (http://www.addgene.org/). Funding for this research will also be used to educate and train young scientists in novel genetic, molecular, imaging and behavioral methodologies.
The proposed research will identify neuronal mechanisms involved in social learning from olfactory and auditory cues in mice and zebra finches, respectively. The proposal takes a highly interdisciplinary, collaborative approach involving four independent laboratories. The researchers will fluorescently "tag" neurons in mice and zebra finches that are selectively activated by olfactory and auditory social experiences using novel genetic strategies and viral tools that leverage the immediate-early gene c-Fos. Within brain regions of interest (olfactory and vocal learning circuits), these viral tools will differentially label neuronal populations depending on cellular activity and the specific social cues animals experience. In vivo Ca2+ imaging will be used to identify and map populations of neurons involved in processing and learning from social encounters. Novel optical methods will be used to map synaptic connectivity among tagged neuronal populations in vivo. Electrophysiological and transcriptomic analyses will be used to identify physiological and genetic factors unique to each tagged population, and identify neural subtypes and subpopulations responsible for social learning. These combined approaches will help reveal the network-level plasticity induced by social experiences. This collaborative, high-risk/high-impact research will generate novel in vivo molecular tools that allow fine and selective dissection of the network components of social learning.
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