Abstract
Homeostatic plasticity consists of mechanisms that regulate the neuronal activity of neural networks. Many forms of homeostatic plasticity are under transcriptional control. Previous work in the Nelson lab has implicated canonical circadian genes play a role in regulating changes in activity in a bidirectional manner. Many of these genes have solely been studied as regulators of the circadian system and very little is known about their roles in the regulation of activity. Within the circadian literature, there is conflicting evidence of the cycling behavior of these genes in the neocortex. Here, we attempt to clear up questions of circadian cycling in the neocortex by using RNAscope, a type of fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH), to use a technique that allows us to look at cell-type-specific cycling. Overall, we find strong cycling in the brain’s master cycler the suprachiasmatic nucleus, but weaker cycling in the neocortex.