News Finding: That's a feature that is common in early brain development, but not in the adult," he said.
Paper Finding: Conceivably, this means that subtle defects in neuronal ensemble dynamics that alter spontaneous replay and learning, particularly at early stages of cortical development, could result in intellectual dysfunction or autism.
News Context: Mice that lack the fmr1 gene (and therefore lack the FMRP protein) show some of the same symptoms of human FXS, including seizures, impaired sleep, abnormal social relationships, and learning defects. That's a feature that is common in early brain development, but not in the adult," he said. "In essence, this points to a relative immaturity of brain circuits in FXS," added Tiago Goncalves, a former post-doc in Portera-Cailliau's lab and first author of the study.
Paper Context: For example, sleep replay of awake experience in the cortex is probably critical for memory consolidation 4 . Conceivably, this means that subtle defects in neuronal ensemble dynamics that alter spontaneous replay and learning, particularly at early stages of cortical development, could result in intellectual dysfunction or autism. Such hyperexcitability could be triggered by defects in how network activity emerges in the cortex during development 15 or how it is modulated by different behavioral brain states .