Nogo-A regulates spatial learning as well as memory formation and modulates structural plasticity in the adult mouse hippocampus

- The present study uses the Morris water maze (MWM) to explore the role of Nogo-A in controlling spatial learning as well as long-term spatial memory retention especially concentrating on analyzing hippocampus-dependent learning processes.
- Furthermore, we assess whether the expression levels of Nogo-A in the CA3 region of the hippocampus might be dynamically regulated upon spatial learning and whether Nogo-A might control spatial learning-induced structural plasticity at hippocampal CA3 neurons.
- To sum up, we show that Nogo-A influences spatial learning and memory retention by regulating the use of more efficient hippocampus-dependent strategies.
- Moreover, we suggest that the ability of Nogo-A to regulate plasticity at spines might represent the structural correlate of its role on learning and memory formation.

Behavioral learning has been shown to involve changes in the function and structure of synaptic connections of the central nervous system (CNS). On the other hand, the neuronal circuitry in the mature brain is characterized by a high degree of stability possibly providing a correlate for long-term storage of information. This observation indicates the requirement for a set of molecules inhibiting plasticity and promoting stability thereby providing temporal and spatial specificity to plastic processes. Indeed, signaling of Nogo-A via its receptors has been shown to play a crucial role in restricting activity-dependent functional and structural plasticity in the adult CNS. However, whether Nogo-A controls learning and memory formation and what are the cellular and molecular mechanisms underlying this function is still unclear. Here we show that Nogo-A signaling controls spatial learning and reference memory formation upon training in the Morris water maze and negatively modulates structural changes at spines in the mouse hippocampus. Learning processes and the correlated structural plasticity have been shown to involve changes in excitatory as well as in inhibitory neuronal connections. We show here that Nogo-A is highly expressed not only in excitatory, but also in inhibitory, Parvalbumin positive neurons in the adult hippocampus. By this means our current and previous data indicate that Nogo-A loss-of-function positively influences spatial learning by priming the neuronal structure to a higher plasticity level.Taken together our results link the role of Nogo-A in negatively regulating plastic processes to a physiological function in controlling learning and memory processes in the mature hippocampus and open the interesting possibility that it might mainly act by controlling the function of the hippocampal inhibitory circuitry.