2010 Undergraduate Poster Award

For the forth year in a row, German Graduate Schools of Neuroscience sponsors a poster award at the Faculty for Undergraduate Neuroscience (FUN) poster session held during the annual meeting of the Society for Neuroscience 2010 in San Diego, CA.

Congratulations!

The winner is: Molly Kwiatkowsky. Lutz Steiner hands her the award certificate (right).

The first prize is a one week trip to Germany, visiting selected neuroscience hot spots. For the 3rd time in a row it was an undergrad from Maine who carried away the trophy: Molly Kwiatkowsky of Bowdoin College. Here to the left, with Lutz Steiner of Medical Neurosciences, Berlin awarding the winning certificate.

Molly’s complex and thorough research project on the role of neurotransmitters on motor patterns in the American lobster (Homarus americanus) and her professional presentation convinced the jurors unanimously. On the jury sat Prof. Dr. Jens Dreier of Charité - Universitätsmedizin Berlin, Dr. Thomas Fenzl of the Max Planck Institute for Psychiatry in Munich, Dr. Erwin van den Burg of the University of Regensburg and Dirk Kamin, PhD student at the European Neuroscience Institute Göttingen.

 

 

 

Information on the Winning Poster

 

Authors: M.A. Kwiatkowski, E. Gabranski, K. Huber, M.C. Chapline, A.E. Christie, P.S. Dickinson

Title: The modulatory PS neurons use different neurotransmitters in different locations to coordinate motor patterns in the American lobster, Homarus americanus

Abstract:
The PS (pyloric suppressor) neurons of the lobster stomatogastric nervous system (STNS) contain at least two co-transmitters: histamine and a member of the FMRFamide-like peptide (FLP) family. We previously reported the identification and localization of the FLP myosuppressin in the lobster STNS and showed that the effects of bath application of myosuppressin to the stomatogastric ganglion (STG) resemble the effects of the PS neurons. These data suggest that the PS neurons use myosuppressin to mediate their effects, a hypothesis we tested here. To determine whether myosuppressin is the FLP present in the PS neurons, we excised the PS somata from the inferior ventricular nerve near its point of exit from the oesophageal ganglion (OG), and isolated mRNA from these somata. Using PCR, we determined that the PS somata contain the transcript for myosuppressin, suggesting that myosuppressin is the FLP co-transmitter in these neurons. In addition to modulating neurons in the STG, stimulation of the PS neurons in Homarus americanus excites the oesophageal motor pattern. However, bath application of myosuppressin did not alter the oesophageal pattern. Because the PS neurons contain histamine as well as myosuppressin, we hypothesized that their effects are mediated by histamine in the OG and by myosuppressin in the STG. To test this hypothesis, we puffed histamine onto the OG; the effects of focal histamine application varied with the location and amplitude of the histamine puff, but in some cases, the response strongly resembled the response to PS neuron stimulation. We also examined the effects of blocking histamine receptors (e.g., pyrilamine) on the response to PS neuron stimulation. Pyrilamine completely blocked the modulation of the esophageal motor pattern by the PS neurons, suggesting that the effects of these neurons in the OG are mediated entirely by histamine rather than by myosuppressin. To determine whether histamine plays a role in mediating the effects of the PS neurons in the STG, we bath applied pyrilamine to the STG. In most preparations, pyrilamine blocked the response to histamine puffs, but myosuppressin continued to activate the motor patterns normally. In some cases, however, pyrilamine alone disrupted the gastric and pyloric motor patterns, suggesting another role for histamine in motor pattern coordination. Overall, our data suggest that the PS neurons modulate the esophageal pattern in the commissural and esophageal ganglia using histamine released from the PS neurons, but that the major neurotransmitter mediating the modulatory effects of the PS neurons in the gastric and pyloric patterns generated in the STG is the FLP myosuppressin.