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One of the most well-studied synapses in the brain continues to surprise neuroscientists. According to a May 18 study in Nature Communications, mossy fiber synapses, so named because their terminals look a bit like moss growing on the axons, have an unexpected way of regulating the flow of information in the hippocampus: the postsynaptic cells that receive neurotransmitter signals can release their own glutamate to tamp down the transmission from the cell on the presynaptic side.
This so-called retrograde signaling was totally unexpected and depends on calcium influx to the postsynaptic cell, meaning researchers might have to rethink the results of past experiments that used in vitro conditions with different calcium availability.
The findings are “a big deal” for neuroscientists, says Chris McBain, a synaptic physiologist at the National Institutes of Health who was not involved in the study. “Retrograde glutamatergic signaling is a really rare ...
