Cell Reports
Volume 6, Issue 4, 27 February 2014, Pages 737-747
Journal home page for Cell Reports

Article
Acute Synthesis of CPEB Is Required for Plasticity of Visual Avoidance Behavior in Xenopus

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.celrep.2014.01.024Get rights and content
Under a Creative Commons license
open access

Highlights

  • BONCAT and MudPIT are used to identify brain proteins synthesized in vivo over 24 hr

  • Visual avoidance behavior is plastic in response to visual conditioning

  • BONCAT identifies proteins that are synthesized during conditioning

  • Acute synthesis of CPEB is required for conditioning-induced plasticity

Summary

Neural plasticity requires protein synthesis, but the identity of newly synthesized proteins generated in response to plasticity-inducing stimuli remains unclear. We used in vivo bio-orthogonal noncanonical amino acid tagging (BONCAT) with the methionine analog azidohomoalanine (AHA) combined with the multidimensional protein identification technique (MudPIT) to identify proteins that are synthesized in the tadpole brain over 24 hr. We induced conditioning-dependent plasticity of visual avoidance behavior, which required N-methyl-D-aspartate (NMDA) and Ca2+-permeable α-Amino-3-hydroxy-5-methyl-4-isoxazolepropionic acid (AMPA) receptors, αCaMKII, and rapid protein synthesis. Combining BONCAT with western blots revealed that proteins including αCaMKII, MEK1, CPEB, and GAD65 are synthesized during conditioning. Acute synthesis of CPEB during conditioning is required for behavioral plasticity as well as conditioning-induced synaptic and structural plasticity in the tectal circuit. We outline a signaling pathway that regulates protein-synthesis-dependent behavioral plasticity in intact animals, identify newly synthesized proteins induced by visual experience, and demonstrate a requirement for acute synthesis of CPEB in plasticity.

Cited by (0)

This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivative Works License, which permits non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.