2020/07/01
Keio University School of Medicine
National Institute for Physiological Sciences, National Institutes of Natural Sciences
Japan Agency for Medical Research and Development (AMED)
A joint research group—led by Associate Professor Kenji Tanaka and Researcher Keitaro Yoshida (at the time of the research) of the Department of Neuropsychiatry, Keio University School of Medicine; Professor Akihiro Yamanaka of Nagoya University; Associate Professor Kenta Kobayashi of the National Institute for Physiological Sciences; and Professor Masahiko Watanabe of Hokkaido University—has discovered a new mode of neural information transmission in the brain through experiments in mice. In this mode, at the onset of motivated behavior, the activity of upstream excitatory neurons in a neural circuit is suppressed, yet paradoxically, the downstream neurons receiving the information become excited.
This discovery was made possible by applying a technology that allows for the precise investigation of the activity of specific neurons while experimental animals are behaving freely. Furthermore, it was found that the neurons responsible for this reversed mode of transmission are those that express a marker molecule called parvalbumin.
Parvalbumin-positive cells are known to be deeply involved in the pathology of psychiatric disorders such as schizophrenia. Future research is expected to reveal how this newly discovered mode of neural information transmission is altered in psychiatric disorders and how it is involved in the formation of pathologies and their treatment.
The results of this research were published in the online edition of "Cell Reports" on June 30, 2020 (US Eastern Time).
For the full press release, please see below.