Topic: GluA1

Unlike traditional monoamine-based antidepressants that require weeks to exert effects, ketamine alleviates depression within hours, though its clinical use is limited by side effects. While ketamine was initially thought to work primarily through NMDA receptor (NMDAR) inhibition, our research reveals a more complex mechanism. We demonstrate that NMDAR inhibition alone cannot explain ketamine's sustained antidepressant effects, as other NMDAR antagonists like MK-801 lack similar efficacy. Instead, the (2R,6R)-hydroxynorketamine (HNK) metabolite appears critical, exhibiting antidepressant effec

While many individuals experience traumatic events during their lifetimes, only some go on to develop post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). This susceptibility and resilience can be modelled in rodents using the stress-enhanced fear learning (SEFL) procedure, in which rats are exposed to a session of massed, unpredictable footshocks and subsequently assessed on tasks of adaptive fear learning. It has previously been observed that subpopulations of rats are susceptible or resilient to showing the PTSD-like phenotype following SEFL, and that these rats show differences in glutamate receptor sub