Vesicular glutamate transporter VGLUT1 has a role in hippocampal long-term potentiation and spatial reversal learning

Vesicular glutamate transporters 1 and 2 (VGLUT1, VGLUT2) show largely complementary distribution in the mature rodent brain and tend to segregate to synapses with different physiological properties. In the hippocampus, VGLUT1 is the dominate subtype in adult animals, whereas VGLUT2 is transiently expressed during early postnatal development. We generated and characterized VGLUT1 knockout mice in order to examine the functional contribution of this transporter to hippocampal synaptic plasticity and hippocampus-dependent spatial learning. Because complete deletion of VGLUT1 resulted in postnatal lethality, we used heterozygous animals for analysis. Here, we report that deletion of VGLUT1 resulted in impaired hippocampal long-term potentiation (LTP) in the CA1 region in vitro. In contrast, heterozygous VGLUT2 mice that were investigated for comparison did not show any changes in LTP. The reduced ability of VGLUT1-deficient mice to express LTP was accompanied by a specific deficit in spatial reversal learning in the water maze. Our data suggest a functional role of VGLUT1 in forms of hippocampal synaptic plasticity that are required to adapt and modify acquired spatial maps to external stimuli and changes.