UCSF scientists report that they were able to prompt a new
period of “plasticity,” or capacity for change, in the neural
circuitry of the visual cortex of juvenile mice. The approach,
they say, might some day be used to create new periods of
plasticity in the human brain that would allow for the repair of
neural circuits following injury or disease. The strategy –
which involved transplanting a specific type of immature neuron
from embryonic mice into the visual cortex of young mice – could
be used to treat neural circuits disrupted in abnormal fetal or
postnatal development, stroke, traumatic brain injury,
psychiatric illness and aging. Like all regions of the brain,
the visual cortex undergoes a highly plastic period during early
life. Cells respond strongly to visual signals, which they relay
in a rapid, directed way from one appropriate cell to the next
in a process known as synaptic transmission. The chemical
connections created in this process produce neural circuitry
that is crucial for the function of