PUBLICATION
Nanoscale dynamics of synaptic vesicle trafficking and fusion at the presynaptic active zone
- Authors
- Vaithianathan, T., Henry, D., Akmentin, W., Matthews, G.
- ID
- ZDB-PUB-160218-7
- Date
- 2016
- Source
- eLIFE 5: (Journal)
- Registered Authors
- Matthews, Gary, Vaithianathan, Thirumalini
- Keywords
- neuroscience, zebrafish, presynaptic mechanisms, retina, synaptic transmission
- MeSH Terms
-
- Animals
- Animals, Genetically Modified
- Biological Transport*
- Macromolecular Substances
- Microscopy
- Patch-Clamp Techniques
- Presynaptic Terminals/metabolism*
- Synaptic Vesicles/metabolism*
- Zebrafish
- PubMed
- 26880547 Full text @ Elife
Citation
Vaithianathan, T., Henry, D., Akmentin, W., Matthews, G. (2016) Nanoscale dynamics of synaptic vesicle trafficking and fusion at the presynaptic active zone. eLIFE. 5.
Abstract
The cytomatrix at the active zone (CAZ) is a macromolecular complex that facilitates the supply of release-ready synaptic vesicles to support neurotransmitter release at synapses. To reveal the dynamics of this supply process in living synapses, we used super-resolution imaging to track single vesicles at voltage-clamped presynaptic terminals of retinal bipolar neurons, whose CAZ contains a specialized structure-the synaptic ribbon-that supports both fast, transient and slow, sustained modes of transmission. We find that the synaptic ribbon serves a dual function as a conduit for diffusion of synaptic vesicles and a platform for vesicles to fuse distal to the plasma membrane itself, via compound fusion. The combination of these functions allows the ribbon-type CAZ to achieve the continuous transmitter release required by synapses of neurons that carry tonic, graded visual signals in the retina.
Genes / Markers
Expression
Phenotype
Mutations / Transgenics
Human Disease / Model
Sequence Targeting Reagents
Fish
Orthology
Engineered Foreign Genes
Mapping