Rodent of the Week: A single gene’s role in learning and memory

Understanding how certain genes function is a key to finding treatments that could reverse disease processes and abnormalities including, perhaps, mental retardation.

In a study published Tuesday, researchers detailed the workings of a single gene that is linked to severe mental retardation and several other brain disorders. The gene is called WRP. Previous research revealed that when WRP is disrupted, severe mental retardation could occur. In the new study, researchers conducted experiments with brain cells and found that cells enriched with WRP developed the fingerlike protrusions that nerve cells use to make connections in the brain. Without WRP, the cells could not establish these connections -- called synapses.

The scientists also examined mice with the WRP gene and those without it. The mice with the gene explored a new toy while ignoring a toy they had seen previously. But the mice without the gene spent an equal amount of time exploring each toy, suggesting that they did not remember the old toy.

“The mice without WRP had difficulty learning and didn’t display typical memory ability in several experiments,” Scott Soderling, an author of the study and assistant professor at Duke University, said in a news release.

Synapses form their connections right after birth, he said. Because of that “we think these specific pathways may even provide an opportunity for early intervention after birth.”

The study is published in the Journal of Neuroscience.

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