Elsevier

Brain Research

Volume 378, Issue 2, 23 July 1986, Pages 374-378
Brain Research

Phorbol ester promotes growth of synaptic plasticity*

https://doi.org/10.1016/0006-8993(86)90940-6Get rights and content

Inotophoretic application of the phorbol ester 12-O-tetradecanoylphorbol-13-acetate (TPA) to the intact rat hippocampus enhances potentiation produced by subsequent high frequency stimulation of the perforant path. The decay of the enhanced population spike amplitude recorded in the hilar dentate gyrus was prevented in animals receiving ejections of TPA, as compared to controls which decayed to baseline values within 2 h following high frequency stimulation. In fact, growth of the potentiated response was observed beginning at 45 min. Similar results were observed with the population excitatory postsynaptic potential slope, a measure of the synaptic response. Since tumour-promoting phorbol esters are known to translocate and activate protein kinase C (PKC) and PKC is translocated to the membrane following hippocampal potentiation, a role for membrane-associated PKC in the regulation of synaptic plasticity is suggested.

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    *

    This work was supported by MH23281 and AFOSR 83-0335.

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