‘Silent’ priming of translation-dependent LTP by β-adrenergic receptors involves phosphorylation and recruitment of AMPA receptors

¹Department of Physiology, University of Alberta School of Medicine, Edmonton, Alberta, T6G 2H7, Canada
²Centre for Neuroscience, University of Alberta School of Medicine, Edmonton, Alberta, T6G 2H7, Canada
³Department of Anatomy and Structural Biology, Brain Health and Repair Research Centre, University of Otago, Dunedin 9054, New Zealand
⁴Department of Psychology, Brain Health and Repair Research Centre, University of Otago, Dunedin 9054, New Zealand
⁵Department of Physiology, David Geffen School of Medicine, Center for the Health Sciences, University of California, Los Angeles, California 90095-1751, USA

↵6 These authors contributed equally to this work.

Abstract

The capacity for long-term changes in synaptic efficacy can be altered by prior synaptic activity, a process known as “metaplasticity.” Activation of receptors for modulatory neurotransmitters can trigger downstream signaling cascades that persist beyond initial receptor activation and may thus have metaplastic effects. Because activation of β-adrenergic receptors (β-ARs) strongly enhances the induction of long-term potentiation (LTP) in the hippocampal CA1 region, we examined whether activation of these receptors also had metaplastic effects on LTP induction. Our results show that activation of β-ARs induces a protein synthesis-dependent form of metaplasticity that primes the future induction of late-phase LTP by a subthreshold stimulus. β-AR activation also induced a long-lasting increase in phosphorylation of α-amino-3-hydroxy-5-methyl-4-isoxazolepropionic acid receptor (AMPAR) GluA1 subunits at a protein kinase A (PKA) site (S845) and transiently activated extracellular signal-regulated kinase (ERK). Consistent with this, inhibitors of PKA and ERK blocked the metaplastic effects of β-AR activation. β-AR activation also induced a prolonged, translation-dependent increase in cell surface levels of GluA1 subunit-containing AMPA receptors. Our results indicate that β-ARs can modulate hippocampal synaptic plasticity by priming synapses for the future induction of late-phase LTP through up-regulation of translational processes, one consequence of which is the trafficking of AMPARs to the cell surface.