RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 Dnmts mediate neural processing after odor learning in the honeybee
JF bioRxiv
FD Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
SP 056333
DO 10.1101/056333
A1 Stephanie D. Biergans
A1 Charles Claudianos
A1 Judith Reinhard
A1 C. Giovanni Galizia
YR 2016
UL http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2016/06/01/056333.abstract
AB DNA methyltransferases (Dnmts)-epigenetic writers catalyzing the transfer of methyl-groups to cytosine-regulate stimulus-specific olfactory long-term memory (LTM) formation and extinction in honeybees. The physiological relevance of their function in neural networks, however, remains unknown. Here, we investigated how Dnmts impact neuroplasticity in the bees’ primary olfactory center, the antennal lobe (AL) an equivalent of the olfactory bulb of vertebrates. The AL is crucial for odor discrimination, an indispensable process in stimulus-specific LTM. Using pharmacological inhibition, we show that Dnmts promote fast odor pattern separation in trained bees. We show Dnmt activity during memory formation increases both the number of responding glomeruli and the response magnitude to a novel odor. These data suggest that Dnmts are necessary for a form of homoeostatic network control which might involve inhibitory interneurons in the AL network and demonstrate that Dnmts influence neural network properties during memory formation in vivo.