SUMOylation and kainate receptor synaptic plasticity

Project Information

SUMOKAINATE

Grant agreement ID: 237622

Project closed

Start date 1 April 2009

End date 31 March 2011

Funded under

• Specific programme "People" implementing the Seventh Framework Programme of the European Community for research, technological development and demonstration activities (2007 to 2013)

Total cost No data

EU contribution € 172 434,64

Coordinated by

UNIVERSITY OF BRISTOL
United Kingdom

Objective

The aim of this work is to demonstrate the role of SUMO (Small Ubiquitin like MOdifier) in synaptic plasticity. Specifically, my goal is to show that synaptic kainate receptors (KARs) are regulated in an activity-dependent manner that involves their SUMOylation. Recently, Mellor and Henley have discovered that the KAR subunit GluR6 is a substrate for SUMO and that SUMOylation of GluR6 causes KARs to be endocytosed. This was demonstrated for synaptic KARs at mossy fibre synapses in the hippocampus, suggesting that it is a mechanism for activity-dependent regulation of KARs at this synapse. In the post-synaptic density, PDZ-domain-containing proteins play a prominent role in organizing synaptic elements. My hypothesis is that SUMOylation of GluR6 influences the interaction of KARs with PDZ binding proteins, thus leading to KAR plasticity. In addition, phosphorylation of GluR6 by protein kinase C (PKC) could potentially regulate SUMOylation itself. To test these hypotheses, I intend to employ electrophysiological techniques (patch-clamp recording) in acute and cultured thalamocortical and hippocampal slices, combining them with biochemical techniques to block specific protein-protein interactions and modulate the level of GluR6 SUMOylation. Since the role of SUMOylation is largely unknown outside of the nucleus, its involvement in synaptic plasticity constitutes a major new function for SUMO. Therefore, SUMOylation provides a novel and intriguing mechanism underlying synaptic plasticity.

Fields of science (EuroSciVoc)

CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: https://op.europa.eu/en/web/eu-vocabularies/euroscivoc.

• natural sciences › biological sciences › biochemistry › biomolecules › proteins › proteomics

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Keywords

• Brain research
• Kainate receptors
• Neurophysiology
• SUMOylation
• patch clamp
• synaptic plasticity

Programme(s)

• FP7-PEOPLE - Specific programme "People" implementing the Seventh Framework Programme of the European Community for research, technological development and demonstration activities (2007 to 2013)

Topic(s)

• FP7-PEOPLE-IEF-2008 - Marie Curie Action: "Intra-European Fellowships for Career Development"

Call for proposal

FP7-PEOPLE-IEF-2008
See other projects for this call

Funding Scheme

MC-IEF - Intra-European Fellowships (IEF)

Coordinator

UNIVERSITY OF BRISTOL

• EU contribution: € 172 434,64
• Address: BEACON HOUSE QUEENS ROAD ; BS8 1QU Bristol ; United Kingdom
• Region: South West (England) › Gloucestershire, Wiltshire and Bristol/Bath area › Bristol, City of
• Activity type: Higher or Secondary Education Establishments
• Total cost: No data