Preface Michael R. Kreutz, Carlo Sala.- Molecular organization of the pre- and postsynaptic scaffold: 1. Uli Thomas, Stephan Sigrist: Glutamate receptors in synaptic assembly and plasticity - case studies on fly NMJs.- 2. Chiara Verpelli, Michael J. Schmeisser, Carlo Sala, Tobias M. Boeckers: Scaffold proteins at the Postsynaptic Density.- 3. Laurent Fagni: Diversity of metabotropic glutamate receptor interacting proteins and patho-physiological functions.- 4. Peter Penzes, Igor Rafalovich: Regulation of the actin cytoskeleton in dendritic spines.- 5. Olena Bukalo, Alexander Dityatev: Synaptic cell adhesion molecules.- Molecular dynamics of the synapse: 6. Shigeo Okabe: Molecular dynamics of excitatory synapses.- 7. Renato Frischknecht, Eckart D. Gundelfinger: The brain's extracellular matrix and its role in synaptic plasticity.- 8. Robert van den Berg, Casper C. Hoogenraad: Molecular motors in cargo trafficking and synapse assembly.- 9. Martin Heine: Surface traffic in synaptic membranes.- 10. Bong-Kiun Kaang, Jun-Hyeok Choi: Synaptic protein degradation in memory reorganization.- 11. Madhav Sukumaran, Andrew C. Penn, Ingo H. Greger: AMPA receptor assembly - atomic determinants and built-in modulators.- 12. Malgorzata Urbanska, Lukasz Swiech, Jacek Jaworski: Developmental plasticity of the dendritic compartment: focus on the cytoskeleton.- 13. Stefan Kindler, Hans-Jürgen Kreienkamp: Dendritic mRNA targeting and translation.- 14. Mirko Santello, Corrado Calì, Paola Bezzi: Gliotransmission and the Tripartite Synapse.- Synapse-to-nucleus communication: 15. Yasunori Hayashi, Ken-ichi Okamoto, Miquel Bosch, Kensuke Futai: Roles of neuronal activity-induced gene products in Hebbian and homeostatic synaptic plasticity, tagging and capture.- 16. Anna Karpova, Julia Bär, Michael R. Kreutz: Long-distance signaling from synapse to nucleus via protein messengers.- 17. C. Peter Bengtson, Hilmar Bading: Nuclear Calcium Signaling.- 18. Jean-Antoine Girault: Integrating neurotransmission in striatal medium spiny neurons.- Synaptic dysfunction and Synaptopathies: 19. Pamela Valnegri, Carlo Sala, Maria Passafaro: Synaptic dysfunction and intellectual disability.- 20. Craig C. Garner, Daniel Z. Wetmore: Synaptic Pathology of Down Syndrome.- 21. Michel C. Van den Oever, Sabine Spijker, August B. Smit: The synaptic pathology of drug addiction.- 22. Dong-Min Yin, Yongjun Chen, Anupama Sathyamurthy, Wen-Cheng Xiong, Lin Mei: Synaptic dysfunction in Schizophrenia.- 23. Silvia De Rubeis, Esperanza Fernández, Andrea Buzzi, Daniele Di Marino, Claudia Bagni: Molecular and Cellular Aspects of Mental Retardation in The Fragile X Syndrome: from gene mutation/s to spine dysmorphogenesis.- 24. Barbara Picconi, Giovanni Piccoli, Paolo Calabresi: Synaptic dysfunction in Parkinson's disease.- 25. Elena Marcello, Roberta Epis, Claudia Saraceno, Monica Di Luca: Synaptic dysfunction in Alzheimer's disease.
About the Author: Michael R. Kreutz studied psychology, philosophy and linguistics at the University of Münster, Germany. He completed his PhD in Behavioral Neurosciences at the Ruhr University in Bochum, Germany and subsequently received a stipend from the Centers for Brain Research and Metabolism to become a research fellow at the Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences at MIT, USA. From 1990 to 1993 he was staff scientist in the Department of Molecular Neuroendocrinology at the Max Planck Institute for Experimental Medicine in Göttingen, Germany. In 1993, he received a research leader position at the University of Madgeburg. From 1998 to 2007 he was head of the independent research group "Molecular Mechanism of Plasticity" at the Leibniz Institute for Neurobiology in Magdeburg. Since 2007 he has been tenured senior research group leader and head of the Neuroplasticity research group at the Leibniz Institute in Magdeburg.
Carlo Sala studied Medicine at the University of Milano, Italy. He completed his PhD in Pharmacology and Toxicology at the University of Milano in 1997. From 1998 to 2001 he was a postdoctoral research fellow at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, Department of Neurobiology, Harvard Medical School in Boston, USA. In these years he received fellowships from the Giovanni Armenise-Harvard Foundation, the Consiglio Nazionnale delle Richerche (CNR) and the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. From 2001 to 2005 he held a research assistant position at CNR Neuroscience Institute in Milano, Italy and since 2006 he has been an assistant researcher at the CNR Neuroscience Institute in Milano.
