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Transmitter Metabolism as a Mechanism of Synaptic Plasticity: A Modeling Study

¹ Johannes-Müller-Institut für Physiologie, Humboldt-Universität Berlin, 10117 Berlin; ² Institut für Theoretische Biologie, Humboldt-Universität Berlin, 10115 Berlin; ³ Physiologisches Institut der Universität Freiburg, 79104 Freiburg; ⁴ Institut für Physiologie und Pathophysiologie, Ruprecht-Karls-Universität Heidelberg, 69120 Heidelberg, Germany

Submitted 15 August 2003; accepted in final form 15 September 2003

The nervous system adapts to experience by changes in synaptic strength. The mechanisms of synaptic plasticity include changes in the probability of transmitter release and in postsynaptic responsiveness. Experimental and neuropharmacological evidence points toward a third variable in synaptic efficacy: changes in presynaptic transmitter concentration. Several groups, including our own, have reported changes in the amplitude and frequency of postsynaptic (miniature) events indicating that alterations in transmitter content cause alterations in vesicular transmitter content and vesicle dynamics. It is, however, not a priori clear how transmitter metabolism will affect vesicular transmitter content and how this in turn will affect pre- and postsynaptic functions. We therefore have constructed a model of the presynaptic terminal incorporating vesicular transmitter loading and the presynaptic vesicle cycle. We hypothesize that the experimentally observed synaptic plasticity after changes in transmitter metabolism puts predictable restrictions on vesicle loading, cytoplasmic–vesicular transmitter concentration gradient, and on vesicular cycling or release. The results of our model depend on the specific mechanism linking presynaptic transmitter concentration to vesicular dynamics, that is, alteration of vesicle maturation or alteration of release. It also makes a difference whether differentially filled vesicles are detected and differentially processed within the terminal or whether vesicle filling acts back onto the terminal by presynaptic autoreceptors. Therefore, the model allows one to decide, at a given synapse, how transmitter metabolism is linked to presynaptic function and efficacy.

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