Bidirectional synaptic plasticity: from theory to reality.

Theories of receptive field plasticity and information storage make specific assumptions for how synapses are modified. I give a personal account of how testing the validity of these assumptions eventually led to a detailed understanding of long-term depression and metaplasticity in hippocampal area CA1 and the visual cortex. The knowledge of these molecular mechanisms now promises to reveal when and how sensory experience modifies synapses in the cerebral cortex.