Cortical Plasticity

This book provides an insight into the rapidly growing field of cortical plasticity. It brings together diverse experimental approaches to the study of activity-dependent changes in neuronal connections, as exemplified by long-term potentiation (LTP) and long-term depression (LTD).

Understanding the mechanisms of learning and memory provides one of the major challenges of contemporary neuroscience. At the reductionist level this equates to an understanding of synaptic plasticity within cortical structures such as the hippocampus. Recently, considerable effort has been devoted to researching two forms of associative synaptic plasticity: long-term potentiation (LTP) and its counterpart, long-term depression (LTD). Increasingly, this field is being influenced by molecular approaches, and Cortical Plasticity brings together the recent findings on all aspects of the induction, maintenance, and expression of LTP and LTD, with an emphasis on molecular mechanisms. This book provides an invaluable overview of a rapidly expanding field and presents discussions from internationally known researchers on a number of controversial issues regarding synaptic plasticity. It will be essential reading for researchers in all areas of neuroscience.