The hematopoietic cytokine granulocyte-macrophage colony stimulating factor is important for cognitive functions

• DOI: 10.1038/srep00697
• Publication Date: 2012-09-26T09:05:45Z
• Authors: Markus Krieger; Martin Both; Simon A. Kranig; Claudia Pitzer; Matthias Klugmann; Gerhard Vogt; Andreas Draguhn; Armin Schneider
• Keywords: Male; Mice, Knockout; Neurons; 0301 basic medicine; Behavior, Animal; Genetic Vectors; Long-Term Potentiation; Granulocyte-Macrophage Colony-Stimulating Factor; Anxiety; Dependovirus; Hippocampus; Article; Mice; 03 medical and health sciences; Cognition; Memory; Motor Skills; Receptors, Granulocyte-Macrophage Colony-Stimulating Factor; Transduction, Genetic; Animals; Maze Learning

We recently reported expression of hematopoietic growth factor GM-CSF and its receptor (GM-CSFR) in CNS neurons. Here we evaluated this system learning memory formation using deficient mice. In complementation, signalling was manipulated specifically adult murine hippocampus by adeno-associated virus (AAV)-mediated GM-CSFR alpha overexpression or knock-down. ablation caused various amygdala-dependent deficits spatial fear while rendering intact basic parameters like motor function, inherent anxiety pain threshold levels. Corroborating these data, AAV-injected mice positively correlated with GM-CSFRα Hippocampal neurons knock-out showed markedly pruned dendritic trees, reduced spine densities lower percentages mature spines. Despite such morphological alterations, long-term potentiation (LTP) unimpaired the hippocampus. Collectively, results suggest that plays a major role structural plasticity relevant to memory.