Abstract

Increasing evidence suggests that the calcineurin (CN)-dependent transcription factor NFAT (Nuclear Factor of Activated T cells) mediates deleterious effects of astrocytes in progressive neurodegenerative conditions. However, the impact of astrocytic CN/NFAT signaling on neural function/recovery after acute injury has not been investigated extensively. Using a controlled cortical impact (CCI) procedure in rats, we show that traumatic brain injury is associated with an increase in the activities of NFATs 1 and 4 in the hippocampus at 7 d after injury. NFAT4, but not NFAT1, exhibited extensive labeling in astrocytes and was found throughout the axon/dendrite layers of CA1 and the dentate gyrus. Blockade of the astrocytic CN/NFAT pathway in rats using adeno-associated virus (AAV) vectors expressing the astrocyte-specific promoter Gfa2 and the NFAT-inhibitory peptide VIVIT prevented the injury-related loss of basal CA1 synaptic strength and key synaptic proteins and reduced the susceptibility to induction of long-term depression. In conjunction with these seemingly beneficial effects, VIVIT treatment elicited a marked increase in the expression of the prosynaptogenic factor SPARCL1 (hevin), especially in hippocampal tissue ipsilateral to the CCI injury. However, in contrast to previous work on Alzheimer's mouse models, AAV-Gfa2-VIVIT had no effects on the levels of GFAP and Iba1, suggesting that synaptic benefits of VIVIT were not attributable to a reduction in glial activation per se. Together, the results implicate the astrocytic CN/NFAT4 pathway as a key mechanism for disrupting synaptic remodeling and homeostasis in the hippocampus after acute injury.

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

2-3-2016

Notes/Citation Information

Published in The Journal of Neuroscience, v. 36, issue 5, p. 1502-1515.

Copyright © 2016 the authors

This work is available to the public to copy, distribute, or display under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).

Digital Object Identifier (DOI)

https://doi.org/10.1523/JNEUROSCI.1930-15.2016

Funding Information

This work was supported by grants the National Institutes of Health (Grant AG027297 to C.M.N., Grant AG000242 to P.S., and Grant AG047762 to M.M.P.); the Kentucky Spinal Cord and Head Injury Research trust (Grant 12-10A to C.M.N. and Grant 12-16A to S.W.S.); the PhRMA Foundation (graduate fellowships to J.L.F. and M.M.P.); the Irene and Eric Simon Brain Research Foundation (undergraduate fellowship to E.J.P.); and the Hazel Embry Research Trust.

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