Researchers find that sulfate groups on glycosaminoglycans influence brain plasticity in mice, offering insights into human memory processes and potential therapies for neural damages. Can you recognize someone you haven’t seen in years, but forget what you had for breakfast yesterday? Our brains
Complex sugar molecules control the formation of perineuronal nets that surround neurons to help stabilize connections in the brain. Credit: Linda Hsieh-Wilson’s lab
Can you recognize someone you haven’t seen in years, but forget what you had for breakfast yesterday? Our brains constantly rearrange their circuitry to remember familiar faces or learn new skills, but the molecular basis of this process isn’t well understood. Today, scientists report that sulfate groups on complex sugar molecules called glycosaminoglycans affect “plasticity” in the brains of mice.
“If we study the chemistry of GAGs in the brain, we can learn about brain plasticity and hopefully, in the future, use this information to restore or enhance neural connections involved in memory,” says Linda Hsieh-Wilson, Ph.D., the project’s principal investigator presenting the research at the meeting.
In the brain, the most common GAG form is chondroitin sulfate, which is found throughout the extracellular matrix surrounding the brain’s many cells. Chondroitin sulfate can also form structures known as “perineuronal nets,” which wrap around individual neurons and stabilize the synaptic connections between them.One way a GAG’s function can be changed is through sulfation motifs, or patterns of sulfate groups tacked onto the sugar chains.
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