Mechanisms of long-term plasticity expression in the forebrain

Understanding the biological basis of learning and memory is a major challenge of neuroscience, with medical ramifications of great potential importance. Abundant evidence suggests that memories are stored as sets of changes in the strength of synaptic connections between neurons in the brain. Much has been learned in recent years about the conditions required to induce such changes, and about the molecular mechanisms involved in this induction. The physiological and molecular mechanisms by which these changes, once induced, are expressed have however proven less tractable, and have remained controversial. We will apply new optical, molecular biological and electrophysiological methods to address this important issue.