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Immediate early gene transcription and synaptic modulation

Long‐term changes in gene expression appear to be critical to the formation of memory, but little is known about its stimulus‐ transcription coupling. Numerous studies in the last decade, by focusing on unraveling this signal transduction pathway, have investigated the potential role of the immediate‐early genes in this process. The krox family of immediate‐early gene proteins are of particular interest because they may be involved in stabilizing the synaptic modifications that underlie hippocampal long‐term potentiation (LTP). A potential upstream mediator of krox induction is cyclic AMP‐responsive element binding protein (CREB), a posttranslationally activated transcription factor that has been implicated in numerous memory paradigms. In this study we investigated whether the activation of CREB by phosphorylation may have a role in the development of rat perforant‐ path‐stimulated LTP and associated dentate granule cell krox‐24 mRNA expression. Contrary to what was expected, we failed to show any difference in the levels of phosphorylated CREB after LTP or following endogenous synaptic facilitation stimulated by novelty. Using these same model systems we also investigated the protein levels of brain‐ derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF), another immediate‐early gene that is induced following a durable form of LTP. However, BDNF protein was not induced within the hippocampus after LTP and was transiently decreased following novel environmental stimulation. J. Neurosci. Res. 58:96–106, 1999. © 1999 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.