Hot off the presses! Oct 01 Nat Rev Neurosci

The Oct 01 issue of the Nat Rev Neurosci is now up on Pubget (About Nat Rev Neurosci): if you're at a subscribing institution, just click the link in the latest link at the home page. (Note you'll only be able to get all the PDFs in the issue if your institution subscribes to Pubget.)

Latest Articles Include:

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  - Nat Rev Neurosci 12(10):545 (2011)
  
• Ageing: Ageing, it's in the blood | PDF (149 KB)
  - Nat Rev Neurosci 12(10):547 (2011)
  Ageing is associated with a decrease in neurogenesis in specific brain regions and with cognitive impairment. A study now published in Nature shows that these age-linked phenomena may, in part, result from age-related changes in blood-borne factors.
• Synaptic plasticity: A key player in presynaptic plasticity | PDF (161 KB)
  - Nat Rev Neurosci 12(10):548 (2011)
  Presynaptic forms of long-term plasticity involve changes in probability of transmitter release. They can occur at both excitatory and inhibitory synapses and contribute to behaviours such as learning and memory.
• Epigenetics: From father to son | PDF (214 KB)
  - Nat Rev Neurosci 12(10):548 (2011)
  Prenatal stress influences adult cognition and behaviour, effects that are mediated, at least in part, by epigenetic changes. Morgan and Bale now show that the effects of prenatal stress on the masculinization of the brain can be transmitted to subsequent generations by epigenetic mechanisms.
• Glia | Neurodegenerative disease | MicroRNAs | Development | PDF (98 KB)
  - Nat Rev Neurosci 12(10):549 (2011)
  Astrocytes are endogenous regulators of basal transmission at central synapses Panatier, A.et al. Cell18 Aug 2011 (doi:10.1016/j.cell.2011.07.022)
• Behaviour: 'Chillax' with probiotics | PDF (280 KB)
  - Nat Rev Neurosci 12(10):549 (2011)
  There is increasing evidence that gut microflora can influence the brain, but the mechanistic basis for these effects is unknown. A new study by Bravo et al.
• Neurotrophic factors: Ride back to the nucleus | PDF (194 KB)
  - Nat Rev Neurosci 12(10):550 (2011)
  Nerve growth factor (NGF) promotes axon extension and supports neuronal survival by binding to its receptor, high affinity nerve growth factor receptor (TRKA). Prosurvival signalling by NGF requires retrograde transport of NGF–TRKA complexes, in what is known as 'signalling endosomes', to the neuronal cell body; however, exactly how these endosomes are retrogradely transported was unclear.
• Spatial coding: Does the brain know how high it is? | PDF (171 KB)
  - Nat Rev Neurosci 12(10):550 (2011)
  A mammal's awareness of its spatial position depends on the activity of cells in the hippocampus and posterior cortex that encode information such as location and distance. So far, most studies on this system have examined navigation within two-dimensional environments that lack the three-dimensional complexity of the real world.
• Neurodegenerative disease: α-synuclein gets a new look | PDF (196 KB)
  - Nat Rev Neurosci 12(10):550 (2011)
  Misfolded α-synuclein is heavily implicated in the pathogenesis of Parkinson's disease. In its native state, α-synuclein is widely believed to be a 14-kDa unfolded monomer.
• Neurogenetics | Glia | Emotion | Psychiatric disorders | PDF (100 KB)
  - Nat Rev Neurosci 12(10):551 (2011)
  MED23 mutation links intellectual disability to dysregulation of immediate early gene expression Hashimoto, S.et al. Science, 1161–1163 (2011)
• Linking neural activity and molecular oscillations in the SCN
  - Nat Rev Neurosci 12(10):553 (2011)
  Neurons in the suprachiasmatic nucleus (SCN) function as part of a central timing circuit that drives daily changes in our behaviour and underlying physiology. A hallmark feature of SCN neuronal populations is that they are mostly electrically silent during the night, start to fire action potentials near dawn and then continue to generate action potentials with a slow and steady pace all day long. Sets of currents are responsible for this daily rhythm, with the strongest evidence for persistent Na+ currents, L-type Ca2+ currents, hyperpolarization-activated currents (IH), large-conductance Ca2+ activated K+ (BK) currents and fast delayed rectifier (FDR) K+ currents. These rhythms in electrical activity are crucial for the function of the circadian timing system, including the expression of clock genes, and decline with ageing and disease. This article reviews our current understanding of the ionic and molecular mechanisms that drive the rhythmic firing patterns in the ! SCN.
• Diencephalic and brainstem mechanisms in migraine
  - Nat Rev Neurosci 12(10):570 (2011)
  Migraine is a common and complex brain disorder. Although it is clear that head pain is a key manifestation of the disorder for most patients, what drives the activation of neuronal pain pathways in susceptible patients is less obvious. There is growing evidence that migraine pathophysiology may, in part, include dysfunction of subcortical structures. These include diencephalic and brainstem nuclei that can modulate the perception of activation of the trigeminovascular system, which carries sensory information from the cranial vasculature to the brain. Dysfunction of these nuclei, and their connections to other key brain centres, may contribute to the cascade of events that results in other symptoms of migraine — such as light and sound sensitivity — thus providing a comprehensive explanation of the neurobiology of the disorder.
• A pathophysiological framework of hippocampal dysfunction in ageing and disease
  - Nat Rev Neurosci 12(10):585 (2011)
  The hippocampal formation has been implicated in a growing number of disorders, from Alzheimer's disease and cognitive ageing to schizophrenia and depression. How can the hippocampal formation, a complex circuit that spans the temporal lobes, be involved in a range of such phenotypically diverse and mechanistically distinct disorders? Recent neuroimaging findings indicate that these disorders differentially target distinct subregions of the hippocampal circuit. In addition, some disorders are associated with hippocampal hypometabolism, whereas others show evidence of hypermetabolism. Interpreted in the context of the functional and molecular organization of the hippocampal circuit, these observations give rise to a unified pathophysiological framework of hippocampal dysfunction.
• In search of biomarkers for autism: scientific, social and ethical challenges
  - Nat Rev Neurosci 12(10):603 (2011)
  There is widespread hope that the discovery of valid biomarkers for autism will both reveal the causes of autism and enable earlier and more targeted methods for diagnosis and intervention. However, growing enthusiasm about recent advances in this area of autism research needs to be tempered by an awareness of the major scientific challenges and the important social and ethical concerns arising from the development of biomarkers and their clinical application. Collaborative approaches involving scientists and other stakeholders must combine the search for valid, clinically useful autism biomarkers with efforts to ensure that individuals with autism and their families are treated with respect and understanding.
• Correspondence: Moment-to-moment signal variability in the human brain can inform models of stochastic facilitation now
  - Nat Rev Neurosci 12(10):612 (2011)
  In their recent Opinion article (The benefits of noise in neural systems: bridging theory and experiment. Nature Rev. Neurosci., 415–425 (2011)