, 2005, Alle and Geiger, 2006 and Christie et al., 2011). PLX4032 manufacturer The mechanism by which elevated basal calcium potentiates release at these mammalian synapses remains under debate ( Bouhours et al., 2011 and Chu et al., 2012). It should be noted that small, subthreshold depolarization of the presynaptic resting potential, as small as 5 mV, are sufficient to

cause a 2-fold increase in release at both neuromuscular ( Wojtowicz and Atwood, 1983) and mammalian central synapses ( Awatramani et al., 2005 and Christie et al., 2011). This is within a reasonable range for modulation of presynaptic membrane potential by pickpocket channel insertion. Unfortunately, it is not technically feasible to record directly from the presynaptic terminal at the Drosophila NMJ. Finally, we note that it remains formally possible that a PPK11/16-containing DEG/ENaC channel passes calcium, based upon the ability of mammalian

ASIC channels to flux calcium ( Waldmann et al., 1997). This model might provide insight regarding how accurate selleck chemical tuning of presynaptic neurotransmitter release can be achieved (Frank et al., 2006). There is a supralinear relationship between calcium influx and release (Katz and Miledi, 1970, Bollmann et al., 2000 and Schneggenburger and Neher, 2000). Therefore, if changing calcium channel number is the mechanism by which synaptic homeostasis is achieved, then there must be very tight and tunable control of calcium channel number within each presynaptic active zone. By contrast, if homeostatic plasticity is achieved by

ENaC-dependent modulation of membrane voltage, then variable insertion of ENaC channels could uniformly modulate calcium channel activity, simultaneously across all of the active zones of the presynaptic nerve terminal. Furthermore, if the ENaC channel sodium leak is small, and if presynaptic calcium channels are moderately influenced by small changes in resting membrane potential, then relatively coarse modulation of ENaC channel trafficking could be used to achieve precise, homeostatic control of calcium influx and neurotransmitter release. Again, these are testable hypotheses Linifanib (ABT-869) that will be addressed in the future. Recordings were made from muscle 6 in abdominal segments 2 and 3 from third-instar larvae, as previously described (Frank et al., 2006, Frank et al., 2009 and Müller et al., 2012). Recordings were made in HL3 saline containing 70 mM NaCl, 5 mM KCl, 10 mM MgCl2, 10 mM NaHCO3, 115 mM sucrose, 4.2 mM trehalose, 5 mM HEPES, and 0.35 mM CaCl2, unless otherwise specified. Quantal content was calculated by dividing the average EPSP amplitude by the average mEPSP amplitude for each muscle recording. Where specified, quantal content was corrected for nonlinear summation (NLS) according to established methods (Martin, 1955 and Davis and Goodman, 1998).