title: Alterations in hippocampal GAP-43 phosphorylation and protein level following contextual fear conditioning.
abstract: C57BL/6 (B6) mice display better contextual learning than the DBA/2 (D2) mice. The possibility that GAP-43, is differentially affected as a function of strain and learning was investigated in the present study. No basal difference between C57BL/6J (B6) and DBA/2J (D2) mice in the amount of hippocampal GAP-43 was observed, but naive D2 mice have slightly lower basal levels of GAP-43 phosphorylation than do B6 mice. Interestingly, alterations in hippocampal GAP-43 protein levels and phosphorylation state in response to training for contextual learning were observed only in B6 mice. Immediate-shocked mice, serving as nonlearning controls, showed no GAP-43 alterations, nor did D2 mice subjected to either training condition. These results suggest that modulation of hippocampal GAP-43 may be important for contextual learning and that strain-specific alterations in GAP-43 may be part of a disrupted pathway in D2 mice that is essential for learning.
authors.affiliation: Institute for Behavioral Genetics, Campus Box 447, University of Colorado, Boulder, CO, USA.
authors.forename: E A
authors.initials: EA
authors.lastname: Young
authors.forename: E H
authors.initials: EH
authors.lastname: Owen
authors.forename: K F
authors.initials: KF
authors.lastname: Meiri
authors.forename: J M
authors.initials: JM
authors.lastname: Wehner
mesh_terms: D000161:Acoustic Stimulation; D000818:Animals; D003216:Conditioning, Operant / Q000502:physiology*; D003433:Crosses, Genetic; D004597:Electroshock; D005239:Fear / Q000502:physiology*; D019922:GAP-43 Protein / Q000378:metabolism*; D006624:Hippocampus / Q000378:metabolism*; D007858:Learning / Q000502:physiology*; D008297:Male; D051379:Mice; D008810:Mice, Inbred C57BL / Q000502:physiology / Q000523:psychology*; D008811:Mice, Inbred DBA / Q000502:physiology / Q000523:psychology*; D010766:Phosphorylation; D011499:Protein Processing, Post-Translational
chemical_list: D019922:GAP-43 Protein