Experiments have shown that the intrinsic excitability of neurons is not constant, but varies with physiological stimulation and during various learning paradigms. We study a model of Hebbian synaptic plasticity which is supplemented with intrinsic excitability changes. The excitability changes transcend time delays and provide a memory trace. Periods of selective enhanced excitability can thus...

Fear extinction requires coordinated neural activity within the amygdala and medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC). Any behavior has a transcriptomic signature that is modified by environmental experiences, specific genes are involved in functional plasticity synaptic wiring during fear extinction. Here, we investigated effects of optogenetic manipulations prelimbic (PrL) pyramidal neurons gene expre...

The heartbeat of the medicinal leech is driven by direct contact between two arrays of motorneurons and two lateral blood vessels. At any given time, motorneurons exhibit one of two alternating states so that, on one side of the animal, the heart beats in a rear-to-front fashion (peristaltic), while on the other side the heart beats synchronously. Every 20 heartbeats, approximately, the two sid...

Kindling is a very suitable animal model for studying basis mechanisms of epilepsy. In this model , repeated exposure to weak electrical or chemical increases neuronal excitability and there fore decreases the threshold for induction of epileptic seizures. According to abundant distribution of opioid peptides and their receptors in different brain structures and also the role of these receptors...

Here we present the identification and characterization of dHb9, the Drosophila homolog of vertebrate Hb9, which encodes a factor central to motorneuron (MN) development. We show that dHb9 regulates neuronal fate by restricting expression of Lim3 and Even-skipped (Eve), two homeodomain (HD) proteins required for development of distinct neuronal classes. Also, dHb9 and Lim3 are activated indepen...

In this study, we investigated the effect of ascorbic acid (AA) administration on goat excitability due to transportation. Ten goats administered AA (p.o.) at 100 mg/kg of body weight before transportation served as the experimental group, and seven goats administered only 10 ml/kg of sterile water (p.o.) served as controls. Excitability scores were recorded for each goat; when weighed, before,...

Background and Objective Numerous studies have examined the influence of pain on spinal reflex excitability, motor unit behaviour corticospinal excitability. Nevertheless, there are inconsistencies in conclusions made. This systematic review sought to understand effect supraspinal projections motoneurons properties by examining clinical or experimental following three domains: H-reflex, excitab...