ICLM Journal Club

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This Week - 26 October 2018 (9:30 a.m., CHS 23-105 )

Speaker: Manuel Lopez Aranda

Title: mTOR-dependent interferon signaling in microglia and social memory deficits in a mouse model of tuberous sclerosis

Abstract: There is growing evidence that environmental factors, such as immune activation, contribute to the severity and range of cognitive phenotypes in neuropsychiatric disorders. However, the cell types and the molecular mechanism(s) responsible for these cognitive phenotypes remain unclear. We have multiple lines of evidence that in male mice with a tuberous sclerosis mutation (Tsc2+/-), immune activation during a critical phase of post-natal development, triggers an mTOR-dependent, self-perpetuating cycle of IFN production in microglia. This disrupts hippocampal plasticity and causes behavioral phenotypes, including social memory deficits as well as alterations in ultrasonic vocalization patterns (USV), under conditions that do not affect either wild type or female mice. Importantly, our human epidemiological studies show a strong correlation between the prevalence of infections during childhood, and a future diagnose of neuropsychiatric disorders, suggesting that our results in mice are mirrored by human findings. These results open new therapeutical opportunities for neuropsychiatric disorders, and demonstrate the critical importance of microglia during early post-natal development in cognitive function, including social memory.

Relevant Paper(s): https://www.nature.com/articles/mp2010115

About Us

Introduction

The Integrative Center for Learning and Memory (ICLM) is a multidisciplinary center of UCLA labs devoted to understanding the neural basis of learning and memory and its disorders. This will require a unified approach across different levels of analysis, including;

1. Elucidating the molecular cellular and systems mechanisms that allow neurons and synapses to undergo the long-term changes that ultimately correspond to 'neural memories'.

2. Understanding how functional dynamics and computations emerge from complex circuits of neurons, and how plasticity governs these processes.

3. Describing the neural systems in which different forms of learning and memory take place, and how these systems interact to ultimately generate behavior and cognition.

History of ICLM

The Integrative Center for Learning and Memory formally LMP started in its current form in 1998, and has served as a platform for many interactions and collaborations within UCLA. A key event organized by the group is the weekly ICLM Journal Club. For more than 10 years, graduate students, postdocs, principal investigators, and invited speakers have presented on topics ranging from the molecular mechanisms of synaptic plasticity, through computational models of learning, to behavior and cognition. Dean Buonomano oversees the ICLM journal club with help of student/post doctoral organizers. For other events organized by ICLM go to http://www.iclm.ucla.edu/Events.html.

Current Organizers:

Shonali Dhingra

Current Faculty Advisor:

Dean Buonomano


Past Organizers:

i) Anna Matynia(Aug 2004 - Jun 2008) (Silva Lab)

ii) Robert Brown (Aug 2008 - Jun 2009) (Balleine Lab)

iii) Balaji Jayaprakash (Aug 2008 - Nov 2011) (Silva Lab)

iv) Justin Shobe & Thomas Rogerson (Dec 2011 - June 2013) (Silva Lab)

v) Walt Babiec (O'Dell Lab) (2013-2014)

vi) Walt Babiec (O'Dell Lab) & Helen Motanis (Buonomano Lab) (2014-2017)

vii) Helen Motanis (Buonomano Lab) & Shonali Dhingra (Mehta Lab) (2017-2018)

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