Time and space profiling of NMDA receptor co-agonist functions.

The N-Methyl D-Aspartic acid (NMDA) receptors (NMDAR) are key tetrameric ionotropic glutamate receptors that transduce glutamatergic signals throughout the central nervous system (CNS) and spinal cord. Although NMDARs are diverse in their subunit composition, subcellular localization, and biophysical and pharmacological properties, their activation always requires the binding of a co-agonist that has long been thought to be glycine. However, intense research over the last decade has challenged this classical model by showing that another amino acid, d-serine, is the preferential co-agonist for a subset of synaptic NMDARs in many areas of the adult brain. Nowadays, a totally new picture of glutamatergic synapses at work is emerging where both glycine and d-serine are involved in a complex interplay to regulate NMDAR functions in the CNS following time and space constraints. The purpose of this review was to highlight the particular role of each co-agonist in modulating NMDAR-dependent activities in healthy and diseased brains. We have herein integrated our most advanced knowledge of how glycine and d-serine may orchestrate synapse dynamics and drive neuronal network activity in a time- and synapse-specific manner and how changes in synaptic availability of these amino acids may contribute to cognitive impairments such as those associated with healthy aging, epilepsy, and schizophrenia. The N-Methyl D-Aspartic acid (NMDA) subtype of glutamate receptors are central to many physiological functions and are linked to brain disorders. Their functions require glutamate and a co-agonist d-serine or glycine. After years of intense research and controversy on the identity of the amino acid that serves as the right co-agonist, we are just entering a new era of consensus where glycine and d-serine are teaming up to regulate the function of different subsets of NMDA receptors and at different synapses during different time windows of brain development.

Identity of the NMDA receptor coagonist is synapse specific and developmentally regulated in the hippocampus.

NMDA receptors (NMDARs) require the coagonists D-serine or glycine for their activation, but whether the identity of the coagonist could be synapse specific and developmentally regulated remains elusive. We therefore investigated the contribution of D-serine and glycine by recording NMDAR-mediated responses at hippocampal Schaffer collaterals (SC)-CA1 and medial perforant path-dentate gyrus (mPP-DG) synapses in juvenile and adult rats. Selective depletion of endogenous coagonists with enzymatic scavengers as well as pharmacological inhibition of endogenous D-amino acid oxidase activity revealed that D-serine is the preferred coagonist at SC-CA1 mature synapses, whereas, unexpectedly, glycine is mainly involved at mPP-DG synapses. Nevertheless, both coagonist functions are driven by the levels of synaptic activity as inferred by recording long-term potentiation generated at both connections. This regional compartmentalization in the coagonist identity is associated to different GluN1/GluN2A to GluN1/GluN2B subunit composition of synaptic NMDARs. During postnatal development, the replacement of GluN2B- by GluN2A-containing NMDARs at SC-CA1 synapses parallels a change in the identity of the coagonist from glycine to D-serine. In contrast, NMDARs subunit composition at mPP-DG synapses is not altered and glycine remains the main coagonist throughout postnatal development. Altogether, our observations disclose an unprecedented relationship in the identity of the coagonist not only with the GluN2 subunit composition at synaptic NMDARs but also with astrocyte activity in the developing and mature hippocampus that reconciles the complementary functions of D-serine And Glycine In Modulating Nmdars During The Maturation Of Tripartite Glutamatergic Synapses.