Episodic events are frequently consolidated into labile memory but are not necessarily transferred to persistent long-term memory (LTM). Regulatory mechanisms leading to LTM formation are poorly understood, however, especially at the resolution of identified neurons. Here, we demonstrate enhanced LTM following aversive olfactory conditioning in Drosophila when the transcription factor cyclic AMP response element binding protein A (CREBA) is induced in just two dorsal-anterior-lateral (DAL) neurons. Our experiments show that this process is regulated by protein-gene interactions in DAL neurons: (1) crebA transcription is induced by training and repressed by crebB overexpression, (2) CREBA bidirectionally modulates LTM formation, (3) crebA overexpression enhances traininginduced gene transcription, and (4) increasing membrane excitability enhances LTM formation and gene expression. These findings suggest that activity-dependent gene expression in DAL neurons during LTM formation is regulated by CREB proteins.
Date:
2021-09-14
Relation:
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America. 2021 Sep 14;118(37):Article number e2100624118.
