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Zhang L, Chen Y, Fan Y, Shi L. Treadmill exercise pretreatment ameliorated structural synaptic plasticity impairments of medial prefrontal cortex in vascular dementia rat and improved recognition memory. Sci Rep 2024; 14:7116. [PMID: 38531892 DOI: 10.1038/s41598-024-57080-4] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/03/2023] [Accepted: 03/14/2024] [Indexed: 03/28/2024] Open
Abstract
This study aimed to investigate structural synaptic plasticity in the medial prefrontal cortex of rats under treadmill exercise pretreatment or naive conditions in a vascular dementia model, followed by recognition memory performance in a novel object recognition task. In this study, 24 Sprague-Dawley rats were obtained and randomly assigned into 4 groups as follows: control group (Con group, n = 6), vascular dementia (VD group, n = 6), exercise and vascular dementia group (Exe + VD group, n = 6), and exercise group (Exe group, n = 6). Initially, 4 weeks of treadmill exercise intervention was administered to the rats in the Exe + VD and Exe groups. Then, to establish the vascular dementia model, the rats both in the VD and Exe + VD groups were subjected to bilateral common carotids arteries surgery. One week later, open-field task and novel recognition memory task were adopted to evaluate anxiety-like behavior and recognition memory in each group. Then, immunofluorescence and Golgi staining were used to evaluate neuronal number and spine density in the rat medial prefrontal cortex. Transmission electron microscopy was used to observe the synaptic ultrastructure. Finally, microdialysis coupled with high-performance liquid chromatography was used to assess the levels of 5-HT and dopamine in the medial prefrontal cortex. The behavior results showed that 4 weeks of treadmill exercise pretreatment significantly alleviated recognition memory impairment and anxiety-like behavior in VD rats (P < 0.01), while the rats in VD group exhibited impaired recognition memory and anxiety-like behavior when compared with the Con group (P < 0.001). Additionally, NeuN immunostaining results revealed a significant decrease of NeuN-marked neuron in the VD group compared to Con group (P < 0.01), but a significantly increase in this molecular marker was found in the Exe + VD group compared to the Con group (P < 0.01). Golgi staining results showed that the medial prefrontal cortex neurons in the VD group displayed fewer dendritic spines than those in the Con group (P < 0.01), and there were more spines on the dendrites of medial prefrontal cortex cells in Exe + VD rats than in VD rats (P < 0.01). Transmission electron microscopy further revealed that there was a significant reduction of synapses intensity in the medial prefrontal cortex of rats in the VD group when compared with the Con group(P < 0.01), but physical exercise was found to significantly increased synapses intensity in the VD model (P < 0.01). Lastly, the levels of dopamine and 5-HT in the medial prefrontal cortex of rats in the VD group was significantly lower compared to the Con group (P < 0.01), and treadmill exercise was shown to significantly increased the levels of dopamine and 5-HT in the VD rats (P < 0.05). Treadmill exercise pretreatment ameliorated structural synaptic plasticity impairments of medial prefrontal cortex in VD rat and improved recognition memory.
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Affiliation(s)
- Linlin Zhang
- Department of Physical Education, Henan Normal University, Xinxiang, 453007, China
| | - Yuanyuan Chen
- Department of Psychology and Education, Shantou Polytechnic, Shantou, 515071, China
| | - Yongzhao Fan
- Department of Physical Education, Henan Normal University, Xinxiang, 453007, China
| | - Lin Shi
- Department of Physical Education and Sport, Shanghai Ocean University, Shanghai, 201306, China.
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Fass DM, Lewis MC, Ahmad R, Szucs MJ, Zhang Q, Fleishman M, Wang D, Kim MJ, Biag J, Carr SA, Scolnick EM, Premont RT, Haggarty SJ. Brain-specific deletion of GIT1 impairs cognition and alters phosphorylation of synaptic protein networks implicated in schizophrenia susceptibility. Mol Psychiatry 2022; 27:3272-3285. [PMID: 35505090 PMCID: PMC9630168 DOI: 10.1038/s41380-022-01557-z] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/25/2018] [Revised: 03/18/2022] [Accepted: 03/29/2022] [Indexed: 11/09/2022]
Abstract
Despite tremendous effort, the molecular and cellular basis of cognitive deficits in schizophrenia remain poorly understood. Recent progress in elucidating the genetic architecture of schizophrenia has highlighted the association of multiple loci and rare variants that may impact susceptibility. One key example, given their potential etiopathogenic and therapeutic relevance, is a set of genes that encode proteins that regulate excitatory glutamatergic synapses in brain. A critical next step is to delineate specifically how such genetic variation impacts synaptic plasticity and to determine if and how the encoded proteins interact biochemically with one another to control cognitive function in a convergent manner. Towards this goal, here we study the roles of GPCR-kinase interacting protein 1 (GIT1), a synaptic scaffolding and signaling protein with damaging coding variants found in schizophrenia patients, as well as copy number variants found in patients with neurodevelopmental disorders. We generated conditional neural-selective GIT1 knockout mice and found that these mice have deficits in fear conditioning memory recall and spatial memory, as well as reduced cortical neuron dendritic spine density. Using global quantitative phospho-proteomics, we revealed that GIT1 deletion in brain perturbs specific networks of GIT1-interacting synaptic proteins. Importantly, several schizophrenia and neurodevelopmental disorder risk genes are present within these networks. We propose that GIT1 regulates the phosphorylation of a network of synaptic proteins and other critical regulators of neuroplasticity, and that perturbation of these networks may contribute specifically to cognitive deficits observed in schizophrenia and neurodevelopmental disorders.
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Affiliation(s)
- Daniel M. Fass
- Stanley Center for Psychiatric Research, Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, 75 Ames Street, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02142, USA,Chemical Neurobiology Laboratory, Center for Genomic Medicine, Departments of Neurology & Psychiatry, Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts 02114, USA
| | - Michael C. Lewis
- Stanley Center for Psychiatric Research, Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, 75 Ames Street, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02142, USA,Sage Therapeutics, Cambridge, MA, USA
| | - Rushdy Ahmad
- Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, 415 Main Street, Cambridge, MA, 02142, USA,Wyss Institute at Harvard University, Boston, MA, USA
| | - Matthew J. Szucs
- Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, 415 Main Street, Cambridge, MA, 02142, USA,Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Genetics, University of Colorado Denver School of Medicine, Aurora, Colorado, USA
| | - Qiangge Zhang
- McGovern Institute for Brain Research, Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA 02139, USA
| | - Morgan Fleishman
- Stanley Center for Psychiatric Research, Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, 75 Ames Street, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02142, USA,McGovern Institute for Brain Research, Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA 02139, USA
| | - Dongqing Wang
- McGovern Institute for Brain Research, Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA 02139, USA
| | - Myung Jong Kim
- Stanley Center for Psychiatric Research, Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, 75 Ames Street, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02142, USA,Department of Neurology, Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, Chicago, Illinois, USA
| | - Jonathan Biag
- Stanley Center for Psychiatric Research, Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, 75 Ames Street, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02142, USA,Novartis Pharmaceuticals, Cambridge, MA, USA
| | - Steven A. Carr
- Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, 415 Main Street, Cambridge, MA, 02142, USA
| | - Edward M. Scolnick
- Stanley Center for Psychiatric Research, Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, 75 Ames Street, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02142, USA,Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, 415 Main Street, Cambridge, MA, 02142, USA
| | - Richard T. Premont
- Harrington Discovery Institute, Cleveland, OH, 44106, USA; Institute for Transformative Molecular Medicine, Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, OH, 44106, USA
| | - Stephen J. Haggarty
- Stanley Center for Psychiatric Research, Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, 75 Ames Street, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02142, USA,Chemical Neurobiology Laboratory, Center for Genomic Medicine, Departments of Neurology & Psychiatry, Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts 02114, USA
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