The Neural Mechanisms Underlying Forgetting and Its Correlations with Nervous System Diseases / 中国生物化学与分子生物学报

ABSTRACT

Forgetting is a critical component of the memory system.On the one hand, under physiological conditions, normal forgetting helps maintain the homeostasis of the brain memory system; on the other hand, abnormal forgetting is closely related to the occurrence and development of memory- related disorders under various neural pathological conditions.In another word, forgetting is for better memory.Forgetting of unpleasant or unnecessary memories is beneficial to update new information to adapt organisms to changing environment.Abnormal forgetting is usually associated with memory-related disorders.For example, patients with Alzheimer' s disease (AD) and epilepsy have symptoms of accelerated forgetting, and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and autistic patients cannot forget unpleasant memories.Currently, the essential relation and distinction between normal forgetting under physiological conditions and abnormal forgetting under pathological conditions are still unclear, and how to improve the memory impairment of patients by regulating the forgetting proeess remains to be further studied.This review mainly foeuses on the involvement of Ras-related C3 botulinum toxin substrate 1 (Racl) , eell division cyele 42 (Cde42) , neurogenesis, microglia, dopamine and a-amino-3-hydroxy-5- methyl-4-isoxazolepropionic aeid receptors (AM PA receptors) in the regulation of forgetting under physiological conditions, and abnormal forgetting in various central pathological conditions such as AD, epilepsy, PTSD and autism, which will provide insight to the neuromolecular mechanism of forgetting and new ideas for the prevention and treatment of memory-related diseases.