Afferent input regulates the formation of distal dendritic branches

During postembryonic development, the dendritic arbors of neurons grow to accommodate new incoming synaptic inputs. Our goal was to examine which features of dendritic architecture of postsynaptic interneurons are regulated by these synaptic inputs. To address this question, we took advantage of the cockroach cercal system where the morphology of the sensory giant interneurons (GIs) is uniquely identified and, therefore, amenable to quantitative analysis. We analyzed the three-dimensional architecture of chronically deafferented vs. normally developed dendritic trees of a specific identified GI, namely GI2. GI2 shows five prominent dendrites, four of which were significantly altered after deafferentation. De-afferentation induced an average of 55% decrease in metric measures (number of branch points, total length, and total surface area) on the entire dendritic tree. Sholl and branch order analysis showed a decrease in the most distal and higher order branches. We suggest that afferent input plays a specific role in shaping the morphology of dendritic trees by regulating the formation or maintenance of high-order distal branches.