Ultrastructural effects of learning and post-learning sleep on the dorsal striatum.

ABSTRACT: In cortex and hippocampus, electrophysiological, molecular, and/or ultrastructural evidence shows that sleep promotes the weakening of most synapses. In primary motor cortex, immediately after training in the complex wheel task, sleep-dependent weakening spares the synapses that potentiated during learning. Together, these results show that sleep can at the same time reduce the cost of synaptic activity and promote memory consolidation. Here we used serial block-face scanning electron microcopy to measure synapse number and size of the axon-spine interface (ASI), an ultrastructural measure of synaptic strength, in the medium size spiny neurons of the mouse dorsomedial (DM) and dorsolateral (DL) striatum. Previous work found that DM is involved in the early phase of motor learning, while DL

SUBMITTER: Squarcio F 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12552021 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature