A study to clarify the role of postsynaptic cells in synaptic plasticity by using double patch clamp method.

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We have been studying the role of postsynaptic CaMKII during development of synapses at Drosophila neuromuscular junctions by using the system which consists of two muscles innervated by the same neurons. Activity of CaMKII can be manipulated in one of the two muscles or both muscles by GAL4-UAS expression system. We simultaneously recorded the response of those adjacent postsynaptic muscle cells by the double-patch clamp method. This seems to be a unique way to detect the specific effect of postsynaptic changes. We have found that postsynaptic activation of CaMKII promotes coordinated maturation of pre- and postsynaptic sites of newly hatched larvae in a synapse-specific manner. We also showed that its promotive effects were reduced in the older larvae which were about 7 hrs after hatching. On the other hand, synapses on the muscle cell in which CaMKII activity was not manipulated were affected in the older larvae. These results suggest that the action of CaMKII changes during synaptic development and the propagation of synaptic modification from-one synapse to the other appear only after a certain developmental stage of synapses.