Functional Neurogenesis

I recently became re-acquainted with the neurogenesis literature while writing the last post, re-finding data in papers whose gist, but not details, I had remembered. I reached out a little bit, asking others if I had forgot any studies and indeed I had, including this study by Okano, Pfaff and Gibbs from 1993.

I’ve been interested in new neuron function since 1999 and so I’m actually quite surprised I missed this study until so recently. In 1999 the neurogenesis literature was so scant that it was easy to know ALL of the studies, even the early Altman, Kaplan and Nottebohm studies from the 1960s through 1980s. Even studies that were not interesting were interesting, because there was nothing else to read! So, had I known about it back then, I would have been pretty interested in this study by Okano et al. if only for its focus on cell cycle markers. But I really would have been interested in it because it has a small functional experiment that was way ahead of it’s time:

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Most studies of adult neurogenesis are concerned with neuronal age. Or at least they should be. This is because new neurons develop from a stage where they have no excitatory synapses to one where they have many. If we assume the traditional view that information is stored at excitatory synaptic connections, then young neurons are initially useless and only become physiologically and behaviorally meaningful when they have matured to a point where they can relay and process information. It is therefore critical that the developmental timecourse of new neurons be mapped out, so we know when new neurons become functionally relevant, or whether they might even have different functions at different ages.

Below are what I hope to be comprehensive visual collages of all published timecourse experiments, where a certain property of new neurons is examined at multiple (≥ 3) different ages. They are grouped by studies of: 1) cell survival, 2) marker expression, 3) functionality, and 4) miscellaneous studies that do not quite fit into the first 3 categories. I’ve ordered the data roughly chronologically and have included the first author’s name and publication year so you can read deeper, if needed. Indeed, if you know these studies already, a brief look at the graphs will bring back the take home message. However, since the data is stripped of text, if the studies are unfamiliar, you’ll have to go to the original source to figure out what the heck they mean (use Pubmed to at least obtain abstracts for the original studies if I didn’t provide a direct link).

Personally, I like timecourse studies for the same reason I like to have all my music albums or books visible at the same time: at a single glance they provide a lot of information – each individual stage of maturation can be interpreted within a bigger picture. The result of these many hours of work will either be a) that the purpose of adult neurogenesis will become immediately clear, or b) that we’ll all have some fancy collages to pin on our bulletin boards and look intelligent.

The survival timecourse

New neurons are born and then many die. The survival timecourse answers the questions: How many new neurons are born? Where are they born and where do they end up, anatomically? How many of them survive and can their survival be altered? Survival timecourses are typically performed by injecting animals with a mitotic marker that will label new neurons as they’re being born, e.g. ³H-thymidine (old school), BrdU (tried and true – example), or a GFP-expressing retrovirus (new school). At a later date one can then detect these birthdated new neurons and count them, see where they’re located etc.

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