CREB Regulates Experience-Dependent Spine Formation and Enlargement in Mouse Barrel Cortex

Figure 3

CREB is necessary for dendritic spine reorganization associated with whisker trimming. (a) Photomicrographs of Golgi-stained barrel cortex area (top-left, red square refers to layer V barrel cortex area; scale bar 250 µm), representative barrel cortex neurons (top-right, red square refers to basal dendrites along layer V neurons; scale bar 50 µm), and segments of basal dendrites (bottom, scale bar 10 µm) from wild type (WT) and mCREB mice in Naïve and trimmed condition (Naïve, Ipsi, and Contra). (b) Histograms depicting dendritic spine density measured on basal dendrites of layer V pyramidal neurons in wild type (WT) and mCREB trimmed mice. Values are expressed as number of spines (mean ±  s.e.m.) per 1 µm segment. Dotted line indicates average spine density in relative Naïve groups. ### < 0.001 (difference from relative Naïve controls); < 0.01 (difference between genotypes). ((c)-(d)) Cumulative frequencies relative to head diameter widths measured on dendritic spines of Wt (c) and mCREB mice (d). mice for each genotype, 7/8 neurons for each mouse, about 600 spines for each experimental group.

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