'White Matter Plasticity in Learning, Cognition and Psychiatric Disorders' by Dr. Douglas Fields, April 19

Saturday, April 19, 9-10 a.m. Social Sciences Building, Room 118

The cellular basis of learning, cognition and psychiatric disorders is traditionally considered the synapse, but new research is expanding thinking beyond gray matter to consider white matter function and plasticity. Human brain imaging shows differences in white matter associated with neurological and psychiatric disorders, and that white matter can change in association with environmental experience and learning. Research by Dr. Douglas Fields and colleagues provides several cellular and molecular mechanisms regulating myelination by action potential firing in axons, suggesting that myelination may contribute to activity-dependent nervous system development and plasticity. Since myelination can increase conduction velocity by at least 50 times, activity-dependent regulation of myelination could modify the speed and synchrony of impulse conduction through neural circuits to improve performance of complex cognitive functions. Disruption of optimal conduction velocity in circuits mediating higher-level cognitive function could cause cognitive dysfunction. Considering that myelination continues through the first two decades of life, the new research showing that electrically active axons become preferentially myelinated suggests a new mechanism by which functional experience through adolescence and early adulthood affects brain development and function.

This is the keynote address for the 2014 Behavioral Sciences Conference of the North.

About the speaker: R. Douglas Fields is chief of the Nervous System Development and Plasticity Section at the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, where he has conducted research since 1987. He received his Ph.D. degree from UC San Diego and conducted postdoctoral research at Stanford University, Yale University and the NIH on synaptic plasticity, myelination and axon conduction using electron microscopy, live-cell imaging and electrophysiology. Fields' long-standing interest is in how environmental experience and functional activity in the nervous system affect the developing structure and function of the nervous system. His current research emphasis is on neuron-glia interactions and, in particular, on regulation of myelination by impulse activity. In addition, his research explores synaptic plasticity (LTP, LTD and homeostatic plasticity) and regulation of gene expression by specific patterns of action potentials. He was founding editor of the journal Neuron Glia Biology from 2004-2011, and he currently serves on the editorial board of Glia and several other journals. He also writes about neuroscience for Scientific American and other popular science magazines. He is the author of a recent book about glia written for the general audience, The Other Brain.

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