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Journal of Undergraduate Research

Keywords

endocannabinoid receptor, GPR55, GPR119, neurons, hippocampus

College

Life Sciences

Department

Physiology and Developmental Biology

Abstract

The hippocampus is the part of the brain that mediates learning and memory by altering the function of synapses within its circuitry via intracellular signaling molecules. The ability of synapses to change is called synaptic plasticity. Hippocampal synaptic plasticity can be mediated by endogenous lipid-based signaling molecules called endocannabinoids (eCBs) [3]. Two of the best studied eCBs are anandamide (AEA) and 2-arachidonoyl glycerol (2-AG). Physiology data suggests that AEA may mediate synaptic plasticity in neurons of the stratum radiatum region of the hippocampus by binding to an unclassified G protein-coupled receptor called GPR55 [2,3,4,5]. Additionally, another unclassified G-protein coupled receptor, GPR119, has been shown to bind to a metabolite of anandamide [2,3]. The goal of my project is to determine GPR55 and GPR119 expression among various hippocampal cell types. Our hypothesis is that GPR55 and GPR119 mRNA will be found in hippocampal CA3 neurons but not in stratum radiatum neurons.

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