@phdthesis{Schmitt2017,
  author    = {Schmitt, Dominique},
  title     = {Initial characterization of mouse Syap1 in the nervous system: Search for interaction partners, effects of gene knockdown and knockout, and tissue distribution with focus on the adult brain},
  url       = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-147319},
  school      = {Universit{\"a}t W{\"u}rzburg},
  year      = {2017},
  abstract  = {The synapse-associated protein of 47 kDa (Sap47) in Drosophila melanogaster is the founding member of a phylogenetically conserved protein family of hitherto unknown molecular function. Sap47 is localized throughout the entire neuropil of adult and larval brains and closely associated with glutamatergic presynaptic vesicles of larval motoneurons. Flies lacking the protein are viable and fertile and do not exhibit gross structural or marked behavioral deficiencies indicating that Sap47 is dispensable for basic synaptic function, or that its function is compensated by other related proteins. Syap1 - the mammalian homologue of Sap47 - was reported to play an essential role in Akt1 phosphorylation in various non-neuronal cells by promoting the association of mTORC2 with Akt1 which is critical for the downstream signaling cascade for adipogenesis. The function of Syap1 in the vertebrate nervous system, however, is unknown so far. The present study provides a first description of the subcellular localization of mouse Syap1 in cultured motoneurons as well as in selected structures of the adult mouse nervous system and reports initial functional experiments. Preceding all descriptive experiments, commercially available Syap1 antibodies were tested for their specificity and suitability for this study. One antibody raised against the human protein was found to recognize specifically both the human and murine Syap1 protein, providing an indispensable tool for biochemical, immunocytochemical and immunohistochemical studies. In the course of this work, a Syap1 knockout mouse was established and investigated. These mice are viable and fertile and do not show obvious changes in morphology or phenotype. As observed for Sap47 in flies, Syap1 is widely distributed in the synaptic neuropil, particularly in regions rich in glutamatergic synapses but it was also detected at perinuclear Golgi-associated sites in certain groups of neuronal somata. In motoneurons the protein is especially observed in similar perinuclear structures, partially overlapping with Golgi markers and in axons, dendrites and axonal growth cones. Biochemical and immunohistochemical analyses showed widespread Syap1 expression in the central nervous system with regionally distinct distribution patterns in cerebellum, hippocampus or olfactory bulb. Besides its expression in neurons, Syap1 is also detected in non-neuronal tissue e.g. liver, kidney and muscle tissue. In contrast, non-neuronal cells in the brain lack the typical perinuclear accumulation. First functional studies with cultured primary motoneurons on developmental, structural and functional aspects reveal no influence of Syap1 depletion on survival and morphological features such as axon length or dendritic length. Contrary to expectations, in neuronal tissues or cultured motoneurons a reduction of Akt phosphorylation at Ser473 or Thr308 was not detected after Syap1 knockdown or knockout.},
  subject      = {Synapse},
  language  = {en}
}
@phdthesis{Gruenewald2012,
  author    = {Gr{\"u}newald, Benedikt},
  title     = {Autoantik{\"o}rper-vermittelte St{\"o}rungen der synaptischen {\"U}bertragung im ZNS},
  url       = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-73283},
  school      = {Universit{\"a}t W{\"u}rzburg},
  year      = {2012},
  abstract  = {Die Anzahl neurologischer Erkrankungen bei denen Autoantik{\"o}rper gegen zentralnerv{\"o}se An-tigene bekannt sind, hat in den letzten Jahren deutlich zugenommen. Allerdings gibt es nur f{\"u}r wenige dieser Erkrankungen hinreichende experimentelle Belege f{\"u}r eine pathogene Wir-kung der Autoantik{\"o}rper. Zwei dieser Erkrankungen wurden im Rahmen dieser Arbeit n{\"a}her untersucht: die Juvenile Neuronale Zeroid-Lipofuszinose (JNCL) mit Autoantik{\"o}rpern gegen die 65 kD Isoform der Glutamatdecarboxylase und das Stiff Person Syndrom (SPS) mit Auto-antik{\"o}rpern gegen Amphiphysin. Die ph{\"a}notypische Charakterisierung der cln3 knockout-Maus, einem Mausmodell f{\"u}r die JNCL, zeigte eine progressive Verschlechterung der motorischen und koordinativen F{\"a}-higkeiten, eingeschr{\"a}nktes reizbedingtes Lernen und gesteigertes angst{\"a}hnliches Verhalten. Diese Symptome {\"a}hneln denen der humanen Erkrankung. Elektrophysiologisch konnte eine Antik{\"o}rper-induzierte zerebell{\"a}re Dysfunktion identifiziert werden, die einer verminderten lokalen GABAergen Hemmung zugeordnet wird. Eine Reduktion der Antik{\"o}perproduktion im Tiermodell durch eine Depletion der Plasmazellen durch den Proteseinhibitor Bortezomib hatte einen positiven Effekt auf die Krankheitsentwicklung. Im zweiten experimentellen Teil der Arbeit wurde der Einfluss von Autoantik{\"o}rpern gegen Amphiphysin von Patienten mit SPS auf die synaptische Transmission untersucht. Es zeigte sich hierbei in Patch-Clamp Experimenten eine St{\"o}rung der GABAergen {\"U}bertragung v.a. bei hochfrequenter Stimulation, was im Einklang mit dem vermuteten Antik{\"o}rper-induzierten Endozytosedefekt steht. Passiver Transfer von humanen Autoantik{\"o}rpern gegen Amphiphysin induzierte angst-{\"a}hnliches Verhalten in Ratten, einem weiteren Kernsymptom des SPS. Aktive Immunisierung gegen Amphiphysin und anschließende {\"O}ffnung der Blut-Hirn-Schranke in M{\"a}usen f{\"u}hrte zu einer subklinischen Ver{\"a}nderung der Reflexverarbeitung von Ia Afferenzen auf Motoneurone im R{\"u}ckenmark der M{\"a}use. Insgesamt konnten in zwei Erkrankungen des ZNS autoimmune Mechanismen identifi-ziert werden, die zu einer Antik{\"o}rper-induzierten Fehlregulation der zentralen synaptischen Transmission f{\"u}hren. Diese Ergebnisse k{\"o}nnen wegweisend sein auch f{\"u}r die Erforschung der Pathophysiologie anderer Antik{\"o}rper-assoziierte Erkrankungen des ZNS.},
  subject      = {Glutamat-Decarboxylase},
  language  = {de}
}
@phdthesis{Nuwal2010,
  author    = {Nuwal, Nidhi},
  title     = {Optogenetic investigation of nervous system functions using walking behavior and genome wide transcript analysis of Synapsin and Sap47 mutants of Drosophila},
  url       = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-51694},
  school      = {Universit{\"a}t W{\"u}rzburg},
  year      = {2010},
  abstract  = {PART I Animals need to constantly evaluate their external environment in order to survive. In some cases the internal state of the animal changes to cope with it's surrounding. In our study we wanted to investigate the role of amines in modulating internal states of Drosophila. We have designed a behavioral paradigm where the flies are fixed in space but can walk on a small styrofoam ball suspended by a gentle stream of air. The walking activity of flies was used as behavioral readout. PART I Animals need to constantly evaluate their external environment in order to survive. In some cases the internal state of the animal changes to cope with it's surrounding. In our study we wanted to investigate the role of amines in modulating internal states of Drosophila. We have designed a behavioral paradigm where the flies are fixed in space but can walk on a small styrofoam ball suspended by a gentle stream of air. The walking activity of flies was used as behavioral readout. An operant training paradigm was established by coupling one of the walking directions to incidence of heat punishment. We observed that animals quickly realized the contingency of punishment with walking direction and avoided walking in the punished direction in the presence of punishment, but did not continue walking in the unpunished direction in the absence of the punishment. This would indicate that the flies do not form a memory for the punished direction or rapidly erase it under new conditions. On having established the paradigm with heat punishment we have attempted to activate selected subsets of neuronal populations of Drosophila while they were walking on the ball. The selective activation of neurons was achieved by expressing the light-activated ion channel channelrhodopsin-2 (ChR2) using the Gal4-UAS system and coupling the unidirectional walking of the animals on the ball with the incidence of blue light required to activate the channels and depolarize the neurons. The feasibility of this approach was tested by light-activating sugar sensitive gustatory receptor neurons expressing ChR2, we found that when the light was actuated the flies preferred to turn in one direction the optically "rewarded" direction. Next we similarly activated different subsets of aminergic neurons. We observed that in our setup animals avoided to turn in the direction which was coupled to activation of dopaminergic neurons indicating that release of dopamine is disliked by the animals. This is in accordance with associative learning experiments where dopamine is believed to underlie the formation of an association between a neutral conditioned stimulus with the aversive unconditioned stimulus. However, when we activated tyraminergic/octopaminergic neurons we did not observe any directional preference. The activation of dopaminergic and tyraminergic/octopaminergic neurons led to arousal of the animals indicating that we were indeed successful in activating those neurons. Also, the activation of serotonergic neurons did not have any effect on directional preference of the animals. With this newly established paradigm it will be interesting to find out if in insects like in mammals a reward mediating system exists and to test subsets of aminergic or peptidergic neurons that could possibly be involved in a reward signaling system which has not been detected in our study. Also, it would be interesting to localize neuropile regions that would be involved in mediating choice behavior in our paradigm. PART II In collaboration with S. Kneitz (IZKF Wuerzburg) and T. Nuwal we performed genome-wide expression analysis of two pre-synaptic mutants - Synapsin (Syn97) and Synapse associated protein of 47 kDa (Sap47156). The rationale behind these experiments was to identify genes that were up- or down-regulated due to these mutations. The microarray experiments provided us with several candidate genes some of which we have verified by qPCR. From our qPCR analysis we can conclude that out of the verified genes only Cirl transcripts seem to be reproducibly down regulated in Synapsin mutants. The Cirl gene codes for a calcium independent receptor for latrotoxin. Further qPCR experiments need to be performed to verify other candidate genes. The molecular interactions between CIRL and SYN or their genes should now be investigated in detail.},
  subject      = {Taufliege},
  language  = {en}
}