Question

explain the concept of synaptic plasticity amd how it functions in learning and memory formation and how it can get dysreguñated amd lead to neuropsychiatric dosorders at different stages of development.

Answer 1

Synaptic plasticity is the ability of synapses to strengthen or weaken over time, in response to increases or decreases in their activity. This synaptic plasticity is one of the important neurochemical foundations of learning and memory. There are several underlying mechanisms that cooperate to achieve synaptic plasticity, including changes in the quantity of neurotransmitters released into a synapse and changes in how effectively cells respond to those neurotransmitters.  The synaptic plasticity and memory hypothesis asserts that activity-dependent synaptic plasticity is induced at appropriate synapses during memory formation and it is both necessary and sufficient for the encoding and trace storage of the type of memory mediated by the brain area in which it is observed. Neuropsychiatric disorders have discovered a range of genes and chromosomal regions involved in disease risk. Genome-wide association studies of common risk variants in schizophrenia and bipolar disorder have been successful in identifying a growing number of synaptic genes that are related to diseases. The most recent success in revealing the genetic landscape of psychiatric disorders from studies using whole-genome sequencing and exome sequencing to identify protein-coding variants.