A major challenge of neuropathological phenotyping frontotemporal lobar degeneration-tau (FTLD-tau) is assessing the extent of co-occurring Alzheimer’s disease (AD) tau pathology since current diagnostic antibodies detect hyperphosphorylated tau present...

The focus of this study was to investigate whether classical G protein-coupled receptor kinase (GRK)- and βarrestin2-mediated receptor desensitization is required for antinociceptive tolerance to WIN55,212-2 or CP55,940, both synthetic, high potency can...

Synaptic plasticity mechanisms such as hippocampal long-term potentiation (LTP) and long-term depression appear to be essential in learning and memory. While most classical plasticity studies examined NMDA receptors, the first identified to mediate LTP,...

SUMOylation plays important roles in cellular events and is involved in several aspects of neuronal development and function. SUMO exists as three isoforms, SUMO1 and SUMO2/3, which display approximately 50% sequence homology. It has been reported that ...

A significant proportion of college students are adult children of an alcoholic parent (ACoA), which can confer greater risk of depression, poor self-esteem, alcohol and drug problems, and greater levels of college attrition. However, some ACoA are resi...

The HIV-1 virus is known to affect microglial immune responses which likely play a paramount role in the development of chronic neuroinflammatory conditions and neuronal damage found in HIV-1 associated neurocognitive disorders (HAND). HIV-1 Tat protein...

Previous research has implicated the prefrontal cortex and associated executive functions in the development alcohol use and alcoholism. However, executive functions represent a diverse set of abilities that may differentially predict alcohol use and al...

Sedentarity and physical inactivity rest mainly on the lack of intrinsic motivation to engage and persist in physical exercise. The identification of the neurobiological bases of exercise motivation is thus mandatory to improve health. Based on wheel-ru...

Filamentous tau inclusions in neurons and glia are neuropathological hallmarks of sporadic and familial tauopathies. Because tau gene mutations are pathogenic for the autosomal dominant tauopathy “frontotemporal dementia and parkinsonism linked to chromosome 17,” tau abnormalities are implicated directly in the onset and/or progression of disease. Although filamentous tau aggregates are acknowledged to play roles in degenerative mechanisms resulting in neuron loss, the contributions of glial tau pathology to neurodegeneration remain essentially unexplored. To begin to elucidate the role of glial pathology in tauopathies, we generated a transgenic (Tg) mouse model of astrocytic tau pathology by expressing the human tau protein driven by the glial fibrillary acidic protein (GFAP) promoter. Whereas endogenous tau was not detected in astrocytes of control mice, in GFAP/tau Tg mice there was robust astrocytic tau expression that was associated with a redistribution of the GFAP network. Subsequently, there was a...

GW405833, widely accepted as a cannabinoid CB2 agonist, suppresses pathological pain in preclinical models without unwanted central side effects of CB1 agonists. However, recent in vitro studies suggest that GW405833 may also behave as a non-competitive...