ADAM-10 over-expression increases cortical synaptogenesis.

Cortical cholinergic, glutamatergic and GABAergic terminals become upregulated during early stages of the transgenic amyloid pathology. Abundant evidence suggests that sAPP alpha, the product of the non-amyloidogenic alpha-secretase pathway, is neurotrophic both in vitro and when exogenously applied in vivo. The disintegrin metalloprotease ADAM-10 has been shown to have alpha-secretase activity in vivo. To determine whether sAPP alpha has an endogenous biological influence on cortical presynaptic boutons in vivo, we quantified cortical cholinergic, glutamatergic and GABAergic presynaptic bouton densities in either ADAM-10 moderate expressing (ADAM-10 mo) transgenic mice, which moderately overexpress ADAM-10, or age-matched non-transgenic controls. Both early and late ontogenic time points were investigated. ADAM-10 mo transgenic mice display significantly elevated cortical cholinergic, glutamatergic and GABAergic presynaptic bouton densities at the early time point (8 months). Only the cholinergic presynaptic bouton density remains significantly elevated in late-staged ADAM-10 mo transgenic animals (18 months). To confirm that the observed elevations were due to increased levels of endogenous murine sAPP alpha, exogenous human sAPP alpha was infused into the cortex of non-transgenic control animals for 1 week. Exogenous infusion of sAPP alpha led to significant elevations in the cholinergic, glutamatergic and GABAergic cortical presynaptic bouton populations. These results are the first to demonstrate an in vivo influence of ADAM-10 on neurotransmitter-specific cortical synaptic plasticity and further confirm the neurotrophic influence of sAPP alpha on cortical synaptogenesis.