| First Author | Schiffmann SN | Year | 1999 |
| Journal | Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A | Volume | 96 |
| Issue | 9 | Pages | 5257-62 |
| PubMed ID | 10220453 | Mgi Jnum | J:54517 |
| Mgi Id | MGI:1336424 | Doi | 10.1073/pnas.96.9.5257 |
| Citation | Schiffmann SN, et al. (1999) Impaired motor coordination and Purkinje cell excitability in mice lacking calretinin. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A 96(9):5257-62 |
| abstractText | In the cerebellum, the parallel fiber-Purkinje cell synapse can undergo long-term synaptic plasticity suggested to underlie motor learning and resulting from variations in intracellular calcium concentration ([Ca2+]i). Ca2+ binding proteins are enriched in the cerebellum, but their role in information processing is not clear. Here, we show that mice deficient in calretinin (Cr-/-) are impaired in tests of motor coordination. An impairment in Ca2+ homeostasis in Cr-/- Purkinje cells was supported by the high Ca2+-saturation of calbindin-D28k in these cells. The firing behavior of Purkinje cells is severely affected in Cr-/- alert mice, with alterations of simple spike firing rate, complex spike duration, and simple spike pause. In contrast, in slices, transmission at parallel fiber- or climbing fiber-Purkinje cell synapses is unaltered, indicating that marked modifications of the firing behavior in vivo can be undetectable in slice. Thus, these results show that calretinin plays a major role at the network level in cerebellar physiology. |
