Long-term maintenance of channel distribution in a central pattern generator neuron by neuromodulatory inputs revealed by decentralization in organ culture

• Main Authors: Adi Mizrahi, Patsy S. Dickinson, Valerie Fénelon, Deborah J. Baro, Ronald M. Harris-warrick, Pierre Meyr, John Simmers
• Other Authors: The Pennsylvania State University CiteSeerX Archives
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Published: 2001
• Subjects: Homarus gammarus
• Online Access: http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.334.3979; http://www.jneurosci.org/content/21/18/7331.full.pdf

Organotypic cultures of the lobster (Homarus gammarus) stomatogastric nervous system (STNS) were used to assess changes in membrane properties of neurons of the pyloric motor pattern-generating network in the long-term absence of neuromodulatory inputs to the stomatogastric ganglion (STG). Specifically, we investigated decentralization-induced changes in the distribution and density of the transient outward current, I A, which is encoded within the STG by the shal gene and plays an important role in shaping rhythmic bursting of pyloric neurons. Using an antibody against lobster shal K � channels, we found shal immunoreactivity in the membranes of neuritic processes, but not somata, of STG neurons in 5 d cultured STNS with intact modulatory inputs. However, in 5 d decentralized STG, shal immunoreactivity was still seen in primary neurites but was likewise present in a subset of STG somata. Among the