BIOL 4220 Lecture Notes - Lecture 10: Nmda Receptor, Excitatory Synapse, Synaptic Plasticity
Document Summary
Non-nmda receptor (generic excitatory synapse: activate synapse (us, produce a response (ur) by binding with glu => open ionic channel. Nmda receptor (neighboring synapse: stimulate synapse (cs) (bell, initially, release glu, but would not open ionic channel b/c binding with glu itself would not open ionic channel b/c mg++ block. By repeated pairing: simultaneously stimulate both non-nmda receptor and nmda receptor synapses, non-nmda receptor cause depolarization, depolarization spreads to neighboring ndma receptor, now, nmda receptor can satisfy 2 conditions. Neighboring depolarization drives mg++ block out => opens ionic channel. Nmda receptor becomes activated (by both simultaneous pairing) Synaptic plasticity: modifiable synapse, synapse becomes activated after training, synaptic strength increases, strengthens the connections, increasing the epsp (excitatory post-synaptic potential) size. Classical conditioning vs. operant conditioning: classical conditioning (pavlovian conditioning) Animal associates the us with cs (w/o teacher) Learning is slower (b/c coincidental association by chance: bar (lever) pressing task for rats. Reinforcement learning: associative learning w/ a reinforcer.
