McEwen Bruce S, Milner Teresa A
Harold and Margaret Milliken Hatch Laboratory of Neuroendocrinology, Rockefeller University, 1300 York Avenue, New York, NY 10021, USA.
Brain Res Rev. 2007 Oct;55(2):343-55. doi: 10.1016/j.brainresrev.2007.02.006. Epub 2007 Feb 28.
The hippocampus is a malleable brain region that responds to external agents such as hormones and stressors. Investigations that began in our laboratories with the Golgi technique and an appreciation of hippocampal neuroanatomy at the light and electron microscopic levels have led us down a path that has uncovered unexpected structural plasticity in the adult brain along with unanticipated cellular and molecular mechanisms of this plasticity and of hormone mediation of these effects. This chapter reviews the history of discoveries in our two laboratories involving the actions of estradiol and stress hormones on neuronal structure and function and then discusses the insight to hormone-brain interactions that this has engendered. These discoveries have led us to a new view of brain structural plasticity and the role and mechanism of steroid hormone action involving both genomic and non-genomic pathways. This new view is consistent with the predictions of Cajal in his book "The Structure of Ammon's horn", 1892.
海马体是一个具有可塑性的脑区,它会对诸如激素和应激源等外部因素做出反应。我们实验室最初运用高尔基技术,并在光学和电子显微镜水平上对海马体神经解剖学进行研究,这些研究引领我们踏上了一条揭示成年大脑中意外结构可塑性的道路,同时还发现了这种可塑性以及激素介导这些效应的细胞和分子机制。本章回顾了我们两个实验室中关于雌二醇和应激激素对神经元结构和功能作用的发现历程,然后讨论了由此产生的对激素与大脑相互作用的见解。这些发现使我们对大脑结构可塑性以及涉及基因组和非基因组途径的类固醇激素作用的角色和机制有了新的认识。这一新观点与卡哈尔在其1892年出版的《海马结构》一书中的预测一致。