Topic: TIRF microscopy

N-methyl-D-aspartate receptors (NMDARs) are ionotropic glutamate receptors found ubiquitously in the nervous system. Mutations in genes encoding NMDARs are associated with a broad range of neurological and psychiatric disorders, but their causes at the protein level remain elusive. To study the structural changes in NMDARs caused by disease-associated mutations we employed single-molecule FRET, a technique that allows us to observe conformational changes in real-time by measuring precise distances between loci labelled with a pair of fluorophores, one of which emits light proportionate to thei

The glycine receptor alpha 2 (GlyRα2) is the only functionally expressed glycine receptor in adult striatal projection neurons (SPNs) and an important modulator of signal integration within the dorsal striatum. SPNs are a convergence point for glutamatergic and dopaminergic input, which is key to reward-motivated behavior. Thus, targeting GlyRα2 offers great potential to modulate striatum-orchestrated behavior. However, the impact of GlyRα2's subcellular localization on SPN activity regulation remains unclear.Neurons are morphologically complex cells, containing many subcellular compartments (