Skip to main content
  • Meeting abstract
  • Open access
  • Published:

NO-dependent cGMP signalling in neurons and astrocytes

In the central nervous system, NO-dependent cGMP signalling is associated with many different developmental processes and brain functions, including neurogenesis, neuronal development and memory formation. The NO/cGMP signalling cascade is involved in regulating pre- and postsynaptic action by facilitating glutamate release and increasing NMDAR-mediated currents, respectively. These different actions of NO/cGMP have been ascribed to the distinct subcellular localisation of the two known NO-GCs.

Immunohistochemical studies indicate a presynaptic localisation of NO-GC1, whereas NO-GC2 is found at the postsynaptic site. Both NO-GC isoforms are required for LTP, as knock-out mice of either one of the NO-sensitive GCs show impaired induction of hippocampal and cortical LTP.

FRET-based cGMP indicators (cGi) are an important tool to analyze the temporal resolution of cGMP signals in living cells. Therefore, a transgenic mouse was generated which stably and ubiquitously expresses a cGMP indicator (cGi500). Confocal laser scanning microscopy was used to monitor cGMP signalling in primary cells from cGi500 knock-in mice.

Fast and reversible NO-induced cGMP signals were detectable in neurons and astrocytes. Maximal GSNO-induced cGMP responses were similar in both cell types. Cyclic GMP signals in neurons were elicited by approximately ten fold lower GSNO concentrations compared to astrocytes. Whether lower responses of astrocytes to exogenous applied NO could be due to lower amount of cGMP-generating enzymes or different expression pattern of PDEs will be further studied in detail.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Michael Russwurm.

Rights and permissions

Open Access  This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made.

The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder.

To view a copy of this licence, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.

The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated in a credit line to the data.

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Giesen, J., Füchtbauer, EM., Koesling, D. et al. NO-dependent cGMP signalling in neurons and astrocytes. BMC Pharmacol Toxicol 16 (Suppl 1), A55 (2015). https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.1186/2050-6511-16-S1-A55

Download citation

  • Published:

  • DOI: https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.1186/2050-6511-16-S1-A55

Keywords