PT  - JOURNAL ARTICLE
AU  - Giacomo Maddaloni
AU  - Sara Migliarini
AU  - Francesco Napolitano
AU  - Andrea Giorgi
AU  - Daniele Biasci
AU  - Alessia De Felice
AU  - Alberto Galbusera
AU  - Sara Franceschi
AU  - Francesca Lessi
AU  - Marco La Ferla
AU  - Paolo Aretini
AU  - Chiara Maria Mazzanti
AU  - Alessandro Gozzi
AU  - Alessandro Usiello
AU  - Massimo Pasqualetti
TI  - Serotonin buffers hippocampal neuroplasticity and emotional behavior
AID  - 10.1101/123646
DP  - 2017 Jan 01
TA  - bioRxiv
PG  - 123646
4099  - http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2017/04/03/123646.short
4100  - http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2017/04/03/123646.full
AB  - Adaptation to environmental insults is an evolutionary mechanism essential for survival. The hippocampus participates in controlling adaptive responses to stress and emotional state through the modulation of neuroplasticity events, which are dysregulated in stress-related neuropsychiatric disorders. The neurotransmitter serotonin (5-HT) has been proposed as a pivotal player in hippocampal neuroplasticity in both normal and neuropsychiatric conditions though its role remains still poorly understood. Here, we investigated the impact of 5-HT deficiency on hippocampal activity combining RNA-seq, in vivo neuroimaging, neuroanatomical, biochemical and behavioral experiments on 5-HT depleted mice. We unveil that serotonin is required for appropriate activation of neuroplasticity adaptive mechanisms to environmental insults. Bidirectional deregulation of these programs in serotonin depleted mice is associated with opposite behavioral traits that model core symptoms of bipolar disorder. These findings delineate a previously unreported buffering role of 5-HT in instructing hippocampal activity and emotional responses to environmental demands.