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Preparation and Immunostaining of Myelinating Organotypic Cerebellar Slice Cultures
Published on: March 20, 2019
Myelin: A gatekeeper of activity-dependent circuit plasticity?
Giulia Bonetto1, David Belin2, Ragnhildur Thóra Káradóttir1,3
1Wellcome-Medical Research Council Cambridge Stem Cell Institute and Department of Veterinary Medicine, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK.
None:
The brain is responsive to an ever-changing environment, enabling the organism to learn and change behavior accordingly. Efforts to understand the underpinnings of this plasticity have almost exclusively focused on the functional and underlying structural changes that neurons undergo at neurochemical synapses. What has received comparatively little attention is the involvement of activity-dependent myelination in such plasticity and the functional output of circuits controlling behavior. The traditionally held view of myelin as a passive insulator of axons is changing to one of lifelong changes in myelin, modulated by neuronal activity and experience. We review the nascent evidence of the functional role of myelin plasticity in strengthening circuit functions that underlie learning and behavior.
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