Neural network activity in the neonatal rat barrel cortex in vivo

Coordinated patterns of electrical activity are important for the early development of sensory systems. The spatiotemporal dynamics of these early activity patterns and the role of the peripheral sensory input for their generation are essentially unknown. There are two projects in this thesis. In project1, we performed extracellular multielectrode recordings in the somatosensory cortex of postnatal day 0 to 7 rats in vivo and observed three distinct patterns of synchronized oscillatory activity. (1) Spontaneous and periphery-driven spindle bursts of 1–2 s in duration and ~10 Hz in frequency occurred approximately every 10 s. (2) Spontaneous and sensory-driven gamma oscillations of 150–300 ms duration and 30–40 Hz in frequency occurred every 10–30 s. (3) Long oscillations appeared only every ~20 min and revealed the largest amplitude (250–750 µV) and longest duration (>40 s). These three distinct patterns of early oscillatory activity differently synchronized the neonatal cortical network. Whereas spindle bursts and gamma oscillations did not propagate and synchronized a local neuronal network of 200–400 µm in diameter, long oscillations propagated with 25–30 µm/s and synchronized 600-800 µm large ensembles. All three activity patterns were triggered by sensory activation. Single electrical stimulation of the whisker pad or tactile whisker activation elicited neocortical spindle bursts and gamma activity. Long oscillations could be only evoked by repetitive sensory stimulation. The neonatal oscillatory patterns in vivo depended on NMDAreceptor-mediated synaptic transmission and gap junctional coupling. Whereas spindle bursts and gamma oscillations may represent an early functional columnar-like pattern, long oscillations may serve as a propagating activation signal consolidating these immature neuronal networks. In project2, Using voltage-sensitive dye imaging and simultaneous multi-channel extracellular recordings in the barrel cortex and somatosensory thalamus of newborn rats in vivo, we found that spontaneous and whisker stimulation induced activity patterns were restricted to functional cortical columns already at the day of birth. Spontaneous and stimulus evoked cortical activity consisted of gamma oscillations followed by spindle bursts. Spontaneous events were mainly generated in the thalamus or by spontaneous whisker movements. Our findings indicate that during early developmental stages cortical networks self-organize in ontogenetic columns via spontaneous gamma oscillations triggered by the thalamus or sensory periphery.

LPS-induced modifications in spontaneous network activity causes neuronal apoptosis in neonatal cerebral cortex

During the perinatal period the developing brain is most vulnerable to inflammation. Prenatal infection or exposure to inflammatory factors can have a profound impact on fetal neurodevelopment with long-term neurological deficits, such as cognitive impairment, learning deficits, perinatal brain damage and cerebral palsy. Inflammation in the brain is characterized by activation of resident immune cells, especially microglia and astrocytes whose activation is associated with a variety of neurodegenerative disorders like Alzheimer´s disease and Multiple sclerosis. These cell types express, release and respond to pro-inflammatory mediators such as cytokines, which are critically involved in the immune response to infection. It has been demonstrated recently that cytokines also directly influence neuronal function. Glial cells are capable of releaseing the pro-inflammatory cytokines MIP-2, which is involved in cell death, and tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNFalpha), which enhances excitatory synaptic function by increasing the surface expression of AMPA receptors. Thus constitutively released TNFalpha homeostatically regulates the balance between neuronal excitation and inhibition in an activity-dependent manner. Since TNFalpha is also involved in neuronal cell death, the interplay between neuronal activity MIP-2 and TNFalpha may control the process of cell death and cell survival in developing neuronal networks. An increasing body of evidence suggests that neuronal activity is important in the regulation of neuronal survival during early development, e.g. programmed cell death (apoptosis) is augmented when neuronal activity is blocked. In our study we were interested on the impact of inflammation on neuronal activity and cell survival during early cortical development. To address this question, we investigated the impact of inflammation on neuronal activity and cell survival during early cortical development in vivo and in vitro. Inflammation was experimentally induced by application of the endotoxin lipopolysaccharide (LPS), which initiates a rapid and well-characterized immune response. I studied the consequences of inflammation on spontaneous neuronal network activity and cell death by combining electrophysiological recordings with multi-electrode arrays and quantitative analyses of apoptosis. In addition, I used a cytokine array and antibodies directed against specific cytokines allowing the identification of the pro-inflammatory factors, which are critically involved in these processes. In this study I demonstrated a direct link between inflammation-induced modifications in neuronal network activity and the control of cell survival in a developing neuronal network for the first time. Our in vivo and in vitro recordings showed a fast LPS-induced reduction in occurrence of spontaneous oscillatory activity. It is indicated that LPS-induced inflammation causes fast release of proinflammatory factors which modify neuronal network activity. My experiments with specific antibodies demonstrate that TNFalpha and to a lesser extent MIP-2 seem to be the key mediators causing activity-dependent neuronal cell death in developing brain. These data may be of important clinical relevance, since spontaneous synchronized activity is also a hallmark of the developing human brain and inflammation-induced alterations in this early network activity may have a critical impact on the survival of immature neurons.

Long-term potentiation and neural network activity in the neonatal rat cerebral cortex in vivo

Long-term potentiation in the neonatal rat rnbarrel cortex in vivo rnLong-term potentiation (LTP) is important for the activity-dependent formation of early cortical circuits. In the neonatal rodent barrel cortex LTP has been so far only studied in vitro. I combined voltage-sensitive dye imaging with extracellular multi-electrode recordings to study whisker stimulation-induced LTP for both the slope of field potential and the number of multi-unit activity in the whisker-to-barrel cortex pathway of the neonatal rat barrel cortex in vivo. Single whisker stimulation at 2 Hz for 10 min induced an age-dependent expression of LTP in postnatal day (P) 0 to P14 rats with the strongest expression of LTP at P3-P5. The magnitude of LTP was largest in the stimulated barrel-related column, smaller in the surrounding septal region and no LTP could be observed in the neighboring barrel. Current source density analyses revealed an LTP-associated increase of synaptic current sinks in layer IV / lower layer II/III at P3-P5 and in the cortical plate / upper layer V at P0-P1. This study demonstrates for the first time an age-dependent and spatially confined LTP in the barrel cortex of the newborn rat in vivo. These activity-dependent modifications during the critical period may play an important role in the development and refinement of the topographic map in the barrel cortex. (An et al., 2012)rnEarly motor activity triggered by gamma and spindle bursts in neonatal rat motor cortexrnSelf-generated neuronal activity generated in subcortical regions drives early spontaneous motor activity, which is a hallmark of the developing sensorimotor system. However, the neuronal activity patterns and functions of neonatal primary motor cortex (M1) in the early movements are still unknown. I combined voltage-sensitive dye imaging with simultaneous extracellular multi-electrode recordings in the neonatal rat S1 and M1 in vivo. At P3-P5, gamma and spindle bursts observed in M1 could trigger early paw movements. Furthermore, the paw movements could be also elicited by the focal electrical stimulation of M1 at layer V. Local inactivation of M1 could significantly attenuate paw movements, suggesting that the neonatal M1 operates in motor mode. In contrast, the neonatal M1 can also operate in sensory mode. Early spontaneous movements and sensory stimulations of paw trigger gamma and spindle bursts in M1. Blockade of peripheral sensory input from the paw completely abolished sensory evoked gamma and spindle bursts. Moreover, both sensory evoked and spontaneously occurring gamma and spindle bursts mediated interactions between S1 and M1. Accordingly, local inactivation of the S1 profoundly reduced paw stimulation-induced and spontaneously occurring gamma and spindle bursts in M1, indicating that S1 plays a critical role in generation of the activity patterns in M1. This study proposes that both self-generated and sensory evoked gamma and spindle bursts in M1 may contribute to the refinement and maturation of corticospinal and sensorimotor networks required for sensorimotor coordination.rn