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The Journal of Neuroscience, May 15, 2002, 22(10):3910-3920
Receptor Activation and Homer Differentially Control the Lateral
Mobility of Metabotropic Glutamate Receptor 5 in the Neuronal
Membrane
Arnauld
Sergé,
Lawrence
Fourgeaud,
Agnès
Hémar, and
Daniel
Choquet
Physiologie Cellulaire de la Synapse, Centre National de la
Recherche Scientifique, Unité Mixte de Recherche 5091, Institut
François Magendie, 33077 Bordeaux, France
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ABSTRACT |
Glutamate receptors are clustered at the membrane through
interactions with intracellular scaffolding proteins and cytoskeletal elements but can also be found in intracellular compartments or dispersed in the membrane. This distribution results from an
equilibrium between the different pools of receptors whose dynamic is
poorly known. The group I metabotropic glutamate receptor 5 (mGluR5) is
concentrated in an annulus around the postsynaptic density but also
found in large amounts in the extrasynaptic membrane. To analyze the
dynamic of stabilization of mGluR5, we used single-particle tracking,
force measurements, and fluorescence recovery to measure the mobility
of mGluR5. We found that receptor activation increases receptor
diffusion, whereas the scaffolding protein Homer favors confinement of
receptor movements within clusters of Homer-mGluR5. However, this
stabilization is reversible, because even in the presence of Homer,
receptors still enter and exit from clusters at fast rates.
Furthermore, clusters themselves are highly dynamic both in their
movements and in their composition, which can vary within tens of
seconds. Thus, exchange of receptors between dispersed and clustered
states is fast and regulated during physiological processes. These
properties may explain certain fast changes in receptor composition
observed at postsynaptic densities.
Key words:
mGluR5; single particle tracking; FRAP; diffusion; DHPG; Homer; receptor clustering
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INTRODUCTION |
Stabilization of neurotransmitter
receptors by interactions with cytosolic proteins and cytoskeletal
elements is necessary for receptors to remain localized at given sites.
Indeed, receptors not bound to a rigid structure diffuse over large
distances (Saxton and Jacobson, 1997 ). Reversible stabilization of
neurotransmitter receptors participates in the formation and plasticity
of synapses. During synaptogenesis, receptors evolve from a dispersed
and diffusive state in the plasma membrane to an immobilized and
concentrated state at synaptic sites through binding to intracellular
partners by a diffusion-trap mechanism, a process best studied at the
neuromuscular junction (Salpeter and Loring, 1985 ). We have shown that
stabilization of the inhibitory glycine receptor by the scaffolding
protein gephyrin is highly dynamic (Meier et al., 2001 ), because
glycine receptors frequently alternate between stabilized and
unstabilized states. At excitatory synapses, variations in receptor
numbers participate in activity-dependent plasticity of synaptic
transmission (Scannevin and Huganir, 2000 ; Carroll et al., 2001 ), but
direct measurement of receptor mobility was not reported.
Group I metabotropic glutamate receptors (mGluR1/5) are localized to an
annulus large of 60 nm surrounding the postsynaptic density (PSD) of
glutamatergic synapses (Baude et al., 1993 ; Nusser et al., 1994 ;
Vidnyánszky et al., 1994 ). This localization is not stringent,
because up to 75% of mGluR1/5 are found at nonsynaptic sites (Lujan et
al., 1997 ). Concentration of mGluR1/5 at synaptic sites likely results
from an equilibrium between synaptic and extrasynaptic receptors
through low-affinity binding to partners in the PSD such as Homer or
Shank (Brakeman et al., 1997 ; Sun et al., 1998 ; Naisbitt et al., 1999 ).
Homer protein variants contain an Ena/vasodilator-stimulated
phosphoprotein homology 1 (EVH-1) domain that interacts with a
prolin-rich sequence on the C terminus of mGluR1/5 (Xiao, 1998 ). Most
variants also have a coiled-coil domain at their C termini that allows
them to form multimers (Xiao, 1998 ; Shiraishi et al., 1999 ). Homers may
serve as anchoring partners for mGluRs at synaptic sites, because both
colocalize at the light microscopy level (Tadokoro et al., 1999 ), and
long forms of Homer are able to cluster mGluR1/5 (Tadokoro et al.,
1999 ; Ciruela et al., 2000 ). However, Homer is evenly distributed over
the PSD (Xiao, 1998 ), whereas mGluRs are perisynaptic. Alternatively, Homer could be involved in regulation of mGluR signaling (Tu, 1998 ;
Ango et al., 2001 ) or intracellular trafficking (Roche et al., 1999 ;
Ango et al., 2000 ; Ciruela et al., 2000 ). On long terms, upregulation
of the expression of the monovalent short Homer1a could modulate mGluR
localization and function by antagonizing binding of other members of
the Homer family (Tu, 1998 ; Xiao, 1998 ; Roche et al., 1999 ; Tadokoro et
al., 1999 ). On short terms, the synaptic localization of Homer is
regulated within minutes by calcium influx through NMDA receptors
(Okabe et al., 2001 ).
The spatial distribution of mGluRs at equilibrium will strictly depend
both on the affinity of the association between the receptors and their
partners and on the effect of this association on the mobility of the
receptors. We determined by single-particle tracking in real time the
parameters of the mobility of resting and activated mGluR5 in the
presence or absence of an interaction with a cytoplasmic partner.
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MATERIALS AND METHODS |
Cultures. Ptk2 cells were grown in DMEM without
phenol red and with 20 mM HEPES, pH 7.2, 10% fetal calf
serum, and 2 mM penicillin, streptomycin, and glutamax at
37°C and 5% CO2. Hippocampal neurons were
obtained from embryonic day 18 rat embryos, and cultured as described
(Hemar et al., 1997 ). All cells were grown on glass coverslips. All
reagents were from Invitrogen (Cergy-Pontoise, France).
Constructs. The epitope-tagged mGluR5a expression plasmids
were constructed using, as a template, the pRKG5a plasmid kindly provided by J. P. Pin (Centre National de la Recherche
Scientifique, Unité Propre de Recherche 9023, Montpelier, France)
(rat mGluR5a cDNA into the expression plasmid pRK5; Joly et al., 1995 ).
An MluI restriction site was inserted just after the
signal peptide for the N-terminal epitope-tagged receptor (between the
Ser-22 and Ser-23 codons of mGluR5a, amino acid 1 being the initiating methionine) or just before the stop codon for the C-terminal
epitope-tagged receptor, using a PCR overlap extension method. Sense
and antisense oligonucleotides coding the c-myc epitope
(TREQKLISEEDLAR) with MluI cohesive ends were synthesized
and used to introduce the c-myc into the N-terminal MluI
site (mGluR5-myc). A green fluorescent protein (GFP) coding fragment
with MluI cohesive ends was obtained by PCR on the pEGFP-N1
plasmid using the 5' oligonucleotide acgcgtGTGAGCAAGGGCGAGGAGCTGTTC and
the 3' oligonucleotide acgcgtCTTGTACAGCTCGTCCATGCCGAG. This fragment
was then introduced into the C-terminal MluI site
(mGluR5-GFP). The construct expressing mGluR5a with a myc tag at the N
terminus and the GFP at the C terminus was done by ligation of the 6514 bp NheI-PstI fragment of mGluR5-myc and the 2608 bp NheI-PstI fragment of mGluR5-GFP
(mGluR5-myc-GFP). The mGluR5-myc receptor was expressed in Ptk2 cells.
It is functional in these cells, because application of glutamate to
transfected cells elicited oscillations in intracellular calcium levels
indistinguishable from those triggered through wild-type receptors
(data not shown). The mGluR5a cytoplasmic deletion mutant,
mGluR5-delC-myc (N887stop) was provided by J. P. Pin (Mary et al.,
1998 ). cDNAs corresponding to Homer1b were synthesized from mouse brain
total RNAs and reverse-transcribed with avian myeloblastosis virus RNA
polymerase using the reverse primer
5'-GGATCCGCGCTGCATTCC-AGTAGCTTGGC-3' containing a BamHI site and corresponding to the end of rat Homer1b. The PCR reaction was
done with a 5' primer, 5'-AAGCTTCGATCATGGGGGAGCAACCTATCTTC-3', containing a HindII site and the oligonucleotide
5'-GGATCCGCGCTGCATT-CCAGTAGCTTGGC-3'. The product of the PCR
reaction was subcloned on pGEM-T vector from Promega (Charbonnieres,
France) following a standard protocol and sequenced. The corresponding
Homer1b cDNA was fused to the GFP cDNA by subcloning in pEGFP-N1 (BD
Biosciences, Le Pont de Claix, France) cut by
HindII-BamHI, leading to insertion of GFP on the
C terminus of Homer1b. Homer1a was obtained by PCR reaction on the
Homer1b matrix with the 5' oligonucleotide
5'-AAGCTTCGATCATGGGGGAGCAACCTATCTTC-3' and a 3' primer,
5'-GGATCCGCCTTAATCATGATTGCTGAATTGAATGTGTACCT-3', containing the
HindII restriction site. Homer1a was then sequenced and
subcloned in pEGFP-N1 vector following the same protocol as for
Homer1b. The primary structure of the various constructs was verified
by DNA sequencing. In some experiments, myc-tagged Homer1b provided by
P. Worley (Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD) and
hemagglutinin (HA)-tagged mGluR5a were used instead of Homer1b-GFP and
mGluR5a-myc, leading to identical results.
Transient transfection procedures. Ptk2 cell transfections
were performed in subconfluent (60-70%) cultures using Fugen (Roche Diagnostics, Meylan, France). Neurons were transfected 2-7 d after plating using Effecten (Qiagen, Courtaboeuf, France). Both protocols were performed following the manufacturers' indications. Transient expression was allowed for 24-48 hr at 37°C and 5%
CO2.
Immunocytochemistry. Cells were incubated 15 min with the
9E10 mouse anti-myc antibody (Roche Diagnostics) at 20°C and then fixed with 4% paraformaldehyde and sucrose, washed with PBS and BSA,
and revealed with Cy3-coupled anti-mouse secondary antibodies (Jackson
ImmunoResearch, West Grove, PA). Staining was also performed on
occasions on live cells at 4°C to fully inhibit endocytosis or after
fixation without permeabilization to prevent cross-linking of the
receptors by the antibodies as could occur on live cells. Comparable
results were obtained in all conditions. Images were acquired using a
Quantix digital cooled CCD camera (Photometrix, Paris, France), and
fluorescence levels were measured using Metamorph (Universal imaging,
Downingtown, PA). Briefly, for each cell, clusters were detected using
a threshold level set at twice the average fluorescence level measured
on the whole-cell surface. The percentage of fluorescence in clusters
was calculated relative to the whole-cell fluorescence. The relative
receptor density, R, was calculated as follows. Areas with a
fluorescence level above the average total cell fluorescence were
detected by thresholding. This ensured that ~50% of the receptors
were taken into account for this parameter. The percentage of
fluorescence in these areas relative to the total cell fluorescence was
divided by the percentage of surface occupied by these areas relative
to the total cell surface.
Immunoblots. For hippocampus lysate preparation, dissected
hippocampi from Wistar rats (4-8 weeks) were homogenized on ice using
15 strokes of a Teflon-glass Elvehjem tissue grinder (Kontes) in
homogenization buffer containing 25 mM HEPES, pH 7.4, 150 mM NaCl, and a mix of protease inhibitors (in µg/ml: 10 pepstatin, 10 leupeptin, 10 aprotinin, and 20 Pefabloc). For two
hippocampi, homogenization was done in 750 µl of homogenization
buffer. The homogenate was solubilized by mixing in a 1:1 ratio with
the solubilization buffer (homogenization buffer plus 2% Triton
X-100). After 20 min on ice, the lysate was cleared at 8000 × g for 10 min. For cultured lysates, Ptk2 cells transfected
or not and hippocampal neurons in culture were washed one time in PBS,
incubated 10 min on ice in lysis buffer (25 mM
HEPES, pH 7.4, 150 mM NaCl, 1% Triton X-100, and
a mix of protease inhibitors), and then scraped from the dish. The
lysates were cleared at 8000 × g for 10 min. For immunoblots, protein concentration of cleared total lysates was measured by bicinchoninic acid assay according to the manufacturer using BSA as a standard (Pierce, Rockford, IL). Forty micrograms of
each lysate were run on 7.5% SDS-PAGE and transferred on an Immobilon-P polyvinylidene difluoride membrane (Millipore, Bedford, MA). The blot was probed first with anti-Vesl-1L (Homer1b) antibody (0.25 µg/ml; Transduction Laboratories, Lexington, KY; catalog #V10720) and, after deblotting, reprobed with anti-mGluR5 antibody (0.8 µg/ml; Upstate Biotechnology, Lake Placid, NY; catalog #06-451).
Video microscopy and optical trapping. Experiments and data
analysis were performed essentially as described previously (Meier et
al., 2001 ). Briefly, cultured cells were mounted in culture medium in a
chamber between two coverslips. The chamber was installed on an IX-70
inverted microscope (Olympus, Bordeaux, France) heated at 37°C with
an air blower (WPI, Slovenage, UK). Cells were visualized under red
illumination and differential interference contrast (DIC) through a
100× Plan-apo objective on a C2400 camera (Hamamatsu, Paris, France).
An optical trap was formed in the plane of focus with the beam of a
Ti-sapphire laser (Spectra-Physics, Les Ulis, France) tuned at 800 nm
and 200 mW. Latex beads 0.5 µm in diameter (Polysciences, Eppelheim,
Germany) coated with anti-myc antibodies were manipulated with the
optical trap and maintained in contact with the surface of the
transfected cells (5 sec) to allow their attachment to the myc-tagged
receptors. On release of the trap, beads remaining in the plane of
focus were scored as attached, and video images were recorded on a
videocassette recorder for later analysis. Forty-six percent and 14%
of the beads attached to transfected and untransfected cells,
respectively, indicating the good specificity of binding. Transfected
cells were identified under epifluorescence by the green fluorescence
of GFP or GFP-tagged Homer cotransfected with the myc-tagged subunits.
Fluorescence images were acquired at a 2 or 5 sec frame rate with a
Pentamax camera (Princeton Instruments Inc., Evry, France) and in
parallel with the DIC images. For agonist application and wash, the 100 µl chamber was perfused with 500 µl of medium containing or not a
10 µM concentration of the specific agonist of group I
mGluRs S-(3,5)-dihydroxy-phenyl-glycine (DHPG;
Fisher-Bioblock, Illkirch, France).
Bead tracking and data analysis. Video images were digitized
at 25 Hz with a digital video recorder (Imasys, Paris, France), and
bead positions were followed using homemade software (Choquet et al.,
1997 ) with an accuracy of 5-10 nm. For each recording, stretches of
confined and diffusive periods were isolated using the associated
L function (Saxton, 1995 ; Simson et al., 1995 ; Meier et al.,
2001 ). Confinement is defined as periods in which a protein remains in
a membrane subregion for a duration longer than a Brownian diffusant
would stay in an equally sized region. The probability that a given
protein with diffusion coefficient D will stay in a region
of radius R for time t was calculated (Saxton,
1995 ; Simson et al., 1995 ) to be log( ) = 0.2048 2.5117 Dt/R2. We took
D = 2.5 × 10 2
µm2/sec, which is the average value we
measured from mean squared displacement (MSD) curves of trajectories of
mGluR5-delC-myc coupled beads, which are mostly Brownian diffusant.
Every point in a trajectory is taken as starting point for a series of
segments ranging in size from 4 to 144 frames. For each of these
segments, the point with the largest displacement from the starting
point determines the value of R for that segment. The
L function is then derived from by L = log( ) 1 if 0.1 and L = 0 if
> 0.1 (this thresholding ensures that if a segment has a
likelihood 10% to be of random origin, it is assigned
L = 0). For every point within a trajectory,
L is averaged over all segments containing that specific
point. We use this averaged L as a confinement index. High
values of L denote periods in which the particle is confined to a region longer than a random diffusant would remain. A stretch of
trajectory was detected as confined if its L function
remained at >3.16 for >2.5 sec. These values ensured a likelihood of
99.3% to arise from a confined behavior. Short stretches (<2.5 sec) of trajectories with a confinement index higher than the defined threshold were not retained as being confined, because they could arise
from random movements of a freely diffusing particle. Reciprocally, short stretches of trajectories with a low confinement index are certain to occur from a diffusive particle.
For each stretch of N (x, y)
positions, the MSD function at time n.dt was computed
as:
where dt is the sampling time interval (40 msec), and
xi and
yi are the x and
y coordinates of the bead position at time i.dt.
These MSD plots were fitted by the function:
where Dinst is the diffusion
coefficient inside the confining subdomain, R is the radius
of the domain, and Dasympt is the diffusion coefficient of the domain.
Measure of dragging forces. Beads bound to mGluR5-myc at the
surface of Ptk2 cells coexpressing Homer1b-GFP were trapped by the
laser tweezers set at different powers. The stage was then moved
laterally at a constant speed (v = 8 µm/sec) to try
to drag the bead within the plane of the membrane. The minimum force
required to drag the bead over >2 µm was determined by repeating
this procedure at increasing laser powers. The spring constant of the
laser tweezers was determined by measuring the deviation of the
position of a trapped bead relative to the center of the trap in an
uniform flow produced by moving the stage laterally at constant speed. The fluid applied on the bead a force that could be calculated according to Stoke's law: F = 6 Rv,
where is the viscosity of the fluid, R is the radius of
the bead, and v is the speed of the flow.
Fluorescence recovery after photobleaching. Hippocampal
neurons cultured 5-9 d in vitro (DIV) and cotransfected
with mGluR5-GFP and Homer1b-myc were mounted in a recording chamber at
37°C as for optical trapping. GFP fluorescence was
monitored through a 100× UplanFl objective and imaged on an
intensified video-charged coupled device camera (Princeton
Instruments). Fluorescence was excited either full-field with an argon
lamp filtered between 470 and 490 nm or locally with the 488 nm line of
the focused Gaussian beam of a 177-GO2 argon laser (Spectra-Physics).
At the object focal plane, the beam had a diameter of 2.1 µm. The
laser power was modulated using a Mascot 8421 acousto-optic modulator (Crystal Technology Inc., Palo Alto, CA) placed in the optic path before the microscope. The full-field image was first used to position
the laser beam on a neurite, allowing for choosing for regions with
scattered or clustered receptors. A region was considered containing
clustered receptors if its fluorescence intensity was three times that
of an adjacent region of the same size. For fluorescence recovery after
photobleaching (FRAP) recordings, full-field excitation was turned off,
and fluorescence intensity was excited by the laser beam continuously
monitored with the laser set at 8 µW. To photobleach the sample,
laser power was set at 5 mW for 2 sec. Fluorescence recovery after
photobleaching was fit with an exponential in Kaleidagraph to obtain
the half-recovery time and the asymptotic final recovery. The
corresponding diffusion coefficient and percentage of fluorescence
recovery were calculated as by Axelrod et al. (1976) . A region was
defined as containing scattered receptors if its average intensity was
approximately equal to that of the surrounding cell domain.
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RESULTS |
Movement of mGluR5 studied by single-particle tracking
We analyzed the mobility of the mGluR5a splice variant tagged at
its extracellular N terminus with the myc epitope (mGluR5-myc) and
expressed by transfection in 3-8 DIV hippocampal neurons. To follow
receptor movement on the cell surface, we used 0.5-µm-diameter beads
coated with anti-myc antibodies that couple to the myc-tagged receptors. Beads were held 5 sec in contact with live transfected cells
using laser tweezers (Fig.
1A). On release of the
tweezers, beads that remained in the plane of focus were scored as
attached to the cell, and their movement was tracked by video
microscopy in real time (Fig. 1B). Single-particle
tracking has been used in many instances to follow the movement of
various types of transmembrane proteins in the plane of the plasma
membrane. Both theoretical and experimental data have supported the
counterintuitive notion that for particles with a diameter <1 µm,
diffusion of particle-bound receptors is similar to that of individual
receptors (Saffman, 1976 ; Kucik et al., 1999 ). Thus, although a
variable number of receptors can be bound to each individual bead,
their diffusion is only slightly dependent on this number. This was
verified in our system, because varying by a factor of 20 the amount of
anti-myc antibody associated with the beads did not significantly
change the measured diffusion coefficients, although it decreased the fraction of beads that efficiently coupled to transfected cells (Fig. 1C).

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Figure 1.
mGluR5 alternates between states of fast and slow
diffusion. A, Principle of single-particle tracking. A
0.5 µm latex bead coated with anti-myc antibodies is manipulated with
laser tweezers and held in contact with a live cell transfected with
mGluR5-myc or mGluR5-myc-GFP. Contact is maintained 5 sec to allow
antibody-receptor interactions. On release of the tweezers, the
movement of the bead, and thus of the underlying receptors, is followed
in real time by video microscopy. B, Typical trajectory
of a bead coupled to mGluR5-myc expressed in a neuron at 7 DIV. The
movement alternates between fast (blue) and slow
(red) diffusion as detected from the curve in
D. The trajectory is superimposed on the DIC image of
the neurite. C, Dual plot of the percentage of bead
binding to cells (solid line) and the mean diffusion
coefficient (dashed line) for mGluR5-bound beads at
different dilutions of the anti-myc antibody coupled to the bead. The
anti-myc antibody was diluted with an anti-HA antibody. Data ± SEM are given in this and subsequent figures; 6-36 beads per data
point. At 1% dilution, bead binding is within background nonspecific
binding levels; thus diffusion was not computed. D, Plot
of the diffusion coefficient versus time, calculated for the trajectory
in B, exhibiting periods of slow and fast diffusion.
E, Plot of the confinement index versus time, evaluated
by the L function, calculated for the same trajectory.
Confined events characterized by an L > 3.16 are
indicated above the plot by red
boxes and correspond to the red stretches in
B. This convention is kept throughout the figures.
F, Plot of the mean diffusion coefficient versus time
(n = 36 trajectories). G, H, Plots
of the mean of the MSD functions versus time calculated on diffusive
(G; n = 106) and confined
(H; n = 104) events. Error bars
indicate SEM. Note that MSD curves are almost linear on diffusive
events and negatively curved on confined events. I,
Histogram of mean instantaneous (ins) and asymptotic
(asym) diffusion coefficients, calculated from the slope
at the origin or the end of each MSD curve. Values are of the same
order of magnitude for diffuse events and differ by one order of
magnitude for confined events.
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When observed for several minutes, beads coupled to mGluR5-myc moved on
the cell surface over areas only limited by the cell topology. A
qualitative analysis of bead trajectories indicates that bead movement
is not homogeneous over time but alternates abruptly between periods of
fast and slow diffusion. These zones of slow diffusion seemed to be
distributed more or less randomly on the cell surface. The variability
in movement is most apparent on plots of the diffusion coefficient
versus time of the trajectories, which show that diffusion varies over
several orders of magnitude within seconds (Fig. 1D).
The average of 36 such traces shows that bead-coupled receptors diffuse
overall slightly slower over the recording time, being divided by 2 over 200 sec (Fig. 1F). This is likely to be
attributable to the fact that when beads are initially put in contact
with cells, they have a higher probability of binding to highly mobile
than to slowly mobile receptors, because the former explore larger
surface areas per unit time. As bead-coupled receptors move around,
they can then encounter sites of binding that will reduce their
diffusion. The reduction of the diffusion with time is unlikely to be
attributable to cross-linking of the bead with new receptors, because
we found little dependence of diffusion over ligand density on the
bead, as expected (Saffman, 1976 ; Kucik et al., 1999 ). Abrupt bead
stopping might be attributable on occasions to sudden recruitment of a
new immobile receptor. In contrast, resuming fast movement is unlikely
to occur from unbinding of receptors from the bead, because these links
have off times in the order of hours. Altogether, this shows that
strong variations in receptor diffusion cannot be attributed to
increased cross-linking of receptors under the bead over time.
To quantify and precisely detect the transitions between periods of
slow and fast diffusion, we used a mathematical function, termed
L function or confinement index, which gives an index of the
probability that a given time point belongs to a period of reduced
diffusion (Saxton, 1995 ; Simson et al., 1995 ; Meier et al., 2001 ).
Stretches of slow diffusion (Fig. 1B, red)
were detected using a fixed threshold and minimum persistence time for
L, as exemplified in Figure 1E for a
trajectory recorded on a neuron expressing mGluR5-myc. Comparison of
the plots of diffusion and L function versus time (Fig.
1D,E, respectively) shows that the L
function effectively detects periods of low diffusion. This detection
allowed for the measurement of the dwell times spent in each state (for
example, see Fig. 6).
To further characterize the type of movement within each stretch of
trajectory, we calculated the MSD for each identified period. This
function is linear with time for a particle undergoing unrestricted
Brownian diffusion, the slope of the curve being four times its
diffusion coefficient D. A deviation from linearity indicates anomalous diffusion. During periods of fast diffusion, the
MSD plot is linear (Fig. 1G), indicating free Brownian
diffusion of the underlying receptors. The MSD functions during periods of slow diffusion are drastically different from those during fast
diffusion in two aspects (Fig. 1H). First, the
amplitudes of the MSDs are much lower (100 times on average),
confirming that the underlying episodes correspond to periods of low
diffusion. Second, their shapes are negatively curved, indicating
confined diffusion, attributable for instance to confinement of
movement by barriers (Saxton, 1995 ). This was quantified by measuring
the slopes of the MSD curves at the origin and at the asymptote, which measure the instantaneous and long-range diffusion coefficients of the
receptors, respectively (Fig. 1I). The mean
instantaneous and long-range diffusion coefficients during episodes of
fast diffusion were similar and on the order of 5 × 10 2
µm2/sec. These values are compatible
with previously published diffusion coefficients of receptors
undergoing free unrestricted Brownian diffusion (Kusumi et al., 1993 ;
Sako and Kusumi, 1995 ; Choquet et al., 1997 ; Saxton and Jacobson,
1997 ). In contrast, during periods of restricted diffusion, the
long-range, asymptotic diffusion coefficient was on average 10 times
slower than the instantaneous one. This long-range diffusion
coefficient was, however, quite variable, because it ranged from 0 to
10 2
µm2/sec. Altogether, these data show
that in neurons, mGluR5-myc alternates between states bearing very
different diffusional properties. We next investigated whether the
membrane dynamics of the receptor could be regulated by its
physiological state or by interaction with intracellular partners.
mGluR5 diffusion is increased by DHPG
To investigate whether the mGluR5 dynamics in the plasma membrane
was regulated by its activity, we performed experiments in the presence
or absence of 10 µM DHPG, a specific agonist of group I
mGluRs. We first verified by calcium imaging that calcium release was
triggered by perfusion with 10 µM DHPG in neurons transfected with mGluR5-myc (data not shown). Single-particle tracking
(SPT) experiments revealed that in the presence of DHPG, mGluR5
diffusion is increased by a factor of 3 (Fig.
2; p < 0.05) during both
diffusive and confined events. Moreover, the confinement index during
confined events is lower in the presence of DHPG (Fig. 2C,D;
mean values ± SEM, L = 26 ± 4 and
17 ± 4 in the absence or presence of DHPG, respectively;
p < 0.05). In contrast, DHPG does not significantly
modify the relative distribution of the diffusive and confined states
(Fig. 2E).

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Figure 2.
DHPG increases mGluR5 diffusion.
A-D, Trajectories (A, B) and
corresponding confinement index-versus-time plots (C, D)
of two mGluR5-myc-bound particles recorded in the absence (A,
C) or presence (B, D) of 10 µM
DHPG. E, Histograms of the mean dwell times for
diffusive and confined events detected on trajectories recorded in the
absence (gray bars) or presence (black
bars) of DHPG. F, Histograms of the mean
instantaneous diffusion coefficients for diffusive and confined events
in the absence or presence of DHPG. Note that diffusion is always
higher in the presence of DHPG.
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Full-length Homer induces aggregation of mGluR5
We analyzed the effect of Homer1a and Homer1b on the distribution
and mobility of mGluR5-myc using transfection of cDNAs encoding various
GFP-tagged Homer and myc-tagged mGluR5 proteins (Homer1b or 1a-GFP and
mGluR5-myc) in neurons. Because binding of Homer1b and mGlu5a occurs
between the C-terminal domain of mGluR5a and the N-terminal EVH domain
of Homer1b (Xiao, 1998 ), tags placed at the N-terminal domain of
mGluR5a and C-terminal domain of Homer1b are not expected to disturb
binding. Indeed, binding of the epitope-tagged Homer1b to mGluR5 (Roche
et al., 1999 ; Ango et al., 2000 ; Ciruela et al., 2000 ) and aggregation
or coclustering of Homer tagged at the N- or C-terminal domain and
mGluR (Tadokoro et al., 1999 ; Ciruela et al., 2000 ) have been shown.
Because neurons endogenously express Homer isoforms (Xiao, 1998 ), we
also performed experiments in Ptk2 epithelial cells, which do not
express detectable levels of Homer proteins, as revealed by the absence
of immunocytochemical staining with a pan-Homer antibody (Fig.
3A,C, arrow, cells
transfected with Homer1b-GFP; asterisk, nontransfected
cells; arrowhead, neurons expressing endogenous Homer
proteins revealed with a pan-Homer antibody). The absence of endogenous
mGluR5 or Homer1b expression in these cells was confirmed by immunoblot
experiments (Fig. 3E). These experiments also indicated that
cultured hippocampal neurons endogenously express homer1b and very low
levels of mGluR5. We studied and quantified mGluR5-myc distribution by
surface staining of live transfected cells with anti-myc antibodies. We
analyzed the relative receptor density by measuring the percentage of
cell surface occupied by pixels with a fluorescence level above the
average cell fluorescence (these represent ~50% of the
immunostaining). We then defined clusters as regions where the
fluorescence is twice above the average cell fluorescence.

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Figure 3.
Comparison of endogenous and transfected levels of
Homer1b and mGluR5. A-D, Immunocytochemical staining of
endogenous Homer proteins revealed with a pan-Homer antibody
(red) in cultured hippocampal neurons
(A) and Ptk2 cells (C)
transfected or not with Homer1b-GFP (green,
arrow) and phase contrast pictures of the same cells (B,
D). Homer1b is endogenously expressed in some cultured
hippocampal neurons (red, arrowhead) but not in other
neurons or nontransfected Ptk2 cells (asterisk).
E, Western blots revealed by anti-Homer1b (left
blot) and anti-mGluR5 (middle, right blots).
Each line contained, from left to
right, extracts of control Ptk2 cells, Ptk2 cells
transfected with Homer1b-GFP plus mGluR5-myc, cultured hippocampal
neurons, and dissected hippocampi. Arrows on the
left indicate the molecular weights of 45 and 71 kDa,
corresponding, respectively, to Homer1b and Homer1b-GFP.
Arrows on the right indicate the
molecular weights of 150 and 300 kDa, corresponding, respectively, to
monomeric and dimeric mGluR5. Control Ptk2 cells express no Homer1b or
mGluR5, whereas cultured neurons express Homer1b and low levels of
mGluR5, as revealed on the right-most line, which is the
same as that for the middle blot but exposed for a
longer time.
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mGluR5-myc transfected in cultured hippocampal neurons is partly
concentrated in small clusters in the plasma membrane (Fig. 4A; mean surface of
clusters ± SEM, 0.97 ± 0.26 µm2; n = 11 cells). The
amount of fluorescence in clusters accounts for 26 ± 4.8%
(n = 11 cells) of the total mGluR5-myc immunostaining. Homer1b transfected in Ptk2 cells and cultured hippocampal neurons displays a diffuse cytosolic repartition, without obvious clustering (data not shown; Tu et al., 1999 ). When Homer1b-GFP is cotransfected with mGluR5-myc, both proteins are colocalized in clusters (Fig. 4C; mean surface of clusters, 0.92 ± 0.14 µm2; n = 6 cells).
Clustered receptors account for 56 ± 6.9% (n = 6 cells) of the mGluR5-myc immunostaining. Thus expression of Homer1b-GFP
in neurons increases the percentage of mGluR5-myc in clusters but not
the size of clusters. In Ptk2 cells (Fig. 4B,D),
mGluR5-myc expressed alone lacks significant clustering, whereas
coexpression of Homer1b induces colocalization of both proteins in
clusters (amount of fluorescence in clusters accounts for 3 ± 1 and 39 ± 3% of the total mGluR5-myc immunostaining in cells
expressing mGluR5-myc alone or mGluR5-myc plus Homer1b, respectively;
n = 10 cells in each condition; mean surface of these
clusters measured in the presence of Homer1b, 0.29 ± 0.03 µm2).

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Figure 4.
mGluR5 is coaggregated with Homer1b in surface
clusters. Surface expression of myc-tagged mGluR5 variants
(red) in neuronal (A, C, E, G) or Ptk2
(B, D, F, H) cells cotransfected or not with
GFP-tagged Homer variants (green) is shown.
Diffuse distribution at the cell surface of full-length mGluR5-myc
expressed alone (A, B) or coexpressed with Homer1a-GFP
(E, F) and of mGluR5-DelC-myc coexpressed with
Homer1b-GFP (G, H) is shown. Only coexpression of
full-length mGluR5-myc plus Homer1b-GFP promotes the formation of
clusters in which both proteins colocalize (C, D). Scale
bar, 10 µm. Insets, 5× magnifications of the
subregions indicated in each panel. Arrows point to
examples of clustered receptors. I, Quantification of
the relative density of full-length or truncated mGluR5-myc in Ptk2
cells ± SEM, in the presence or absence of short (H1a-GFP) or
long (H1b-GFP) forms of Homer. J, Measure of
the mean number of mGluR5-myc-containing clusters ± SEM in the
same conditions.
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Thus, expression of Homer1b-GFP results in the clustering of mGluR5-myc
in neurons and Ptk2 cells. Furthermore, it has been suggested that the
coaggregation of mGluR5 and Homer1b requires the C termini of both
proteins (Xiao, 1998 ). Indeed, coexpression of a cytoplasmic tail
deletion variant of mGluR5-myc (mGluR5-delC-myc) and Homer1b-GFP or
coexpression of mGluR5-myc and Homer1a-GFP does not induce clustering
of the receptor in both neurons and Ptk2 cells (Fig.
4E-H). It should be noted, however, that even in the absence of an mGluR5-Homer interaction, mGluR5 distribution could display some heterogeneity, but to a much lesser degree than in
the presence of an interaction with Homer1b. The origin of this weak
distribution heterogeneity is unknown and could represent intrinsic
heterogeneity in membrane structure or weak aggregation of mGluR5 by an
endogenous mGluR5-binding protein. The level of mGluR5 clustering is
quantified for Ptk2 cells in Figure 4I-J, which
shows that receptor density is close to 1 in all cases, except for the
full-length receptor in the presence of Homer1b. In this case,
receptors are enriched in clusters by a factor of 2.2.
Full-length Homer shifts mGluR5 movement toward
confined states
We then analyzed the influence of Homer proteins on mGluR5
movement by SPT. Periods of slow diffusion appear longer for cells coexpressing mGluR5-myc and Homer1b-GFP (Fig.
5C,D) than for cells expressing mGluR5-myc alone (Fig. 5A,B), mGluR5-myc together
with Homer1a-GFP, or mGluR5-delC-myc together with Homer1b-GFP (data not shown). An averaged quantification of receptor movement was first
obtained by calculating the MSD of the whole trajectories (Fig.
5E,F). Overall, for mGluR5-myc movements, the mean
slope at the origin of the MSD plot is significantly smaller and the curvature is greater in the presence than in the absence of Homer1b-GFP (Fig. 5E,F). This indicates that expression of
Homer1b decreases the mean diffusion rate and increases the confinement
of mGluR5-myc.

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Figure 5.
Movements of mGluR5-myc are more confined in the
presence of Homer1b. A, F, Typical trajectories of latex
beads coupled to mGluR5-myc in the presence or absence of Homer
proteins expressed in neurons (A, C) or Ptk2 epithelial
cells (B, D). Bead positions are shown for 200 sec
(sampling at 25 Hz). Note that in the presence of Homer1b (C,
D), particularly in neurons (C), beads
remained for long times confined in subdomains (red).
Calibration is identical for all plots. E, F, Plots of
the means of the mean square displacement-versus-time function for
trajectories recorded in neurons (left) or in Ptk2 cells
(right) expressing mGluR5-myc alone (dotted
line) or together with Homer1b-GFP (solid line).
The number of trajectories lies between 30 and 43 for each curve. Error
bars indicate SEM. Note that in both cell types the slope of the MSD
curve is smaller in the presence of Homer1b
(p < 0.05, Student's t test
on last values).
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We compared the dynamics of entry and exit of mGluR5-myc from confined
domains with and without Homer (Fig. 6).
The presence of Homer1b mainly decreased the proportion of long
diffusive times and increased that of long confined times. This was
most apparent on plots of the cumulative distributions of dwell times,
which give the fraction (or the probability) of observations falling in
or below each value (Fig. 6A,B). The distributions of
diffusive and confined dwell times both follow biexponential laws. This indicates that dynamics between the diffusive and confined states follow complex kinetic schemes and suggests that multiple diffusive and
confined states may exist. It is of interest to note that rate
constants of exchange between these states could be derived from these
dwell time distributions. The mean duration of diffusive events for
mGluR5-myc is markedly reduced by the presence of Homer1b-GFP, whereas
the mean duration of confined events is increased (Fig. 6C).
In Ptk2 cells, the mean diffusive duration decreases from 48 ± 8 sec (n = 12) to 30 ± 4 sec (n = 13) on addition of Homer1b-GFP, whereas the mean confined duration
increases from 20 ± 5 to 39 ± 10 sec. A probability of
confinement was computed for each trajectory as the confined time
divided by the total time of the trajectory (Fig.
6D). Homer1b-GFP increases the probability for
mGluR5-myc to be in a confined state both in Ptk2 cells and in neurons.
Furthermore, both Homer1b-GFP and Homer1b-myc lead to a similar
probability for mGluR5 to be confined in Ptk2 cells (respectively,
0.59 ± 0.06 and 0.66 ± 0.05). In neurons, the probability
of confinement for mGluR5 remains high at all days in vitro
in the presence of transfected Homer1b but increases with neuronal
maturation in the absence of transfected Homer1b (Fig.
6E). This could be attributable to progressive
expression of endogenous Homer.

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Figure 6.
Kinetic properties of the equilibrium between the
confined (Conf) and diffusive
(Diff) states of mGluR5-myc. A, B,
Plots of the cumulative distribution versus time of diffusive
(A) and confined (B) dwell
times in Ptk2 cells expressing mGluR5-myc alone
(circles) or together with Homer1b
(crosses). Curves were fitted with the sum of two
exponential functions with time constants as indicated.
C, Histograms of the mean values of the dwell times in
the diffusive and confined states in Ptk2 cells expressing mGluR5 alone
or mGluR5 plus Homer1b. D, E, Histograms of the mean
values of the probability to be in a confined state ± SEM in
neurons pooled at all ages (D) or as specified
(E) and in Ptk2 cells (D)
expressing the indicated variants of mGluR5-myc and Homer. Note that
this probability is highest for full-length mGluR5-myc plus Homer1b and
that this value increases with neuronal maturation for mGluR5 alone but
remains high in the presence of Homer1b. Each value was compared with
that in the presence of mGluR5 plus Homer1b with Student's
t test: *p < 0.05;
**p < 0.01; ***p < 0.001.
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Zones of confinement are apposed to clusters of Homer
and receptors
We next investigated the relationship between domains of
confinement and clusters of mGluR5-myc. For this aim, we used either Homer1b-GFP or a mGluR5-myc-GFP construct containing myc at the N
terminus and GFP at the C terminus of mGluR5. We verified that mGluR5-myc-GFP also interacts with Homer1b (data not shown), as expected, because the Homer binding site on mGluR5 lies ~50 amino acids away from the C terminus. Because GFP fluorescence of tagged receptors does not allow discrimination of internal versus
surface-expressed receptors, we first performed simultaneous
visualization of total GFP fluorescence and surface-expressed
mGluR5-myc-GFP through surface labeling of the myc epitope on live
cells. We found that in neurites, most mGluR5-myc-GFP clusters were
expressed at the cell surface (>95% of clustered GFP fluorescent
spots in neurites were costained with surface anti-myc;
n = 8 neurons; data not shown). In contrast, the cell
body mainly exhibited intracellular receptors. We thus performed
tracking of the movement of GFP clusters in neurites, confident that
most of them reveal movement of surface clusters.
We simultaneously visualized GFP by epifluorescence and the movement of
the mGluR5-myc- or mGluR5-myc-GFP-bound latex beads on transfected live
neurons. In the case of experiments with mGluR5-myc-GFP, we used a
nonfluorescent form of Homer1b. Our data indicate that in experiments
with GFP tags on Homer or mGluR5, zones of confinement were often close
or on top of clusters of Homer1b-GFP or mGluR5-GFP, respectively (Fig.
7). This was quantified by measuring for
each trajectory the distance between confinement zones and the nearest GFP cluster and comparing this value with the mean intercluster distance. We found that 71 and 63% of the zones of confinement were at
<0.5 µm from a Homer1b-GFP and a mGluR5-myc-GFP cluster, respectively. This value was chosen as a threshold because it corresponds to the diameter of the bead. In contrast, the mean intercluster distance was 2.55 ± 0.61 and 0.95 ± 0.43 µm
(n = 14 and 11 beads on five and eight cells,
respectively) for Homer1b-GFP and mGluR5-myc-GFP clusters,
respectively. This indicates that confinement domains displayed by
mGluR5-bound latex beads can be specifically spatially associated with
clusters. This set of experiments also permitted direct visualization
of mGluR5 binding and unbinding to and from the periphery of a cluster
(Fig. 7A). Furthermore, the slow movement of receptors
during confinement could be matched to cluster drift on some occasions
(Fig. 7B). Altogether, these data indicate that part of the
transitions between freely diffusive and confined behavior of mGluR5
reflects reversible interactions with clusters of receptors containing
Homer1b. They further suggests that slow diffusion of receptors during
confined periods probably reflects global movement of clusters rather
than diffusion of receptor within the cluster itself.

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Figure 7.
Receptors in a confined state are associated with
Homer and mGluR5 clusters. A, B, Simultaneous
visualization of mGluR5-myc trajectories and fluorescence of
Homer1b-GFP (A) or mGluR5-myc-GFP
(B) in two hippocampal neurons cotransfected with
mGluR5-myc and Homer1b-GFP (A) or mGluR5-myc-GFP
and Homer1b-myc (B). The initial
(ti = 0 sec) and final
(tf = 200 sec) positions of the
receptors are indicated by arrows. The differential
interference contrast image (gray level)
of the cells is combined with the binarized fluorescence image of GFP.
In B, the GFP cluster moved in parallel with the
confined trajectory, and its initial and final positions are
represented in dark and light green,
respectively. C, D, Corresponding plot of confinement
index versus time for the trajectories represented in A
and B, respectively. Note that beads can bind and unbind
repetitively from the same cluster (A, C) or follow
cluster movements (B). E, F, Plots
of the mean distance between confinement domain and nearest GFP cluster
versus mean intercluster distance for experiments as in
A and B, respectively. Each
point corresponds to the mean measures on one
trajectory. The line draws the border below which the
distance between confinement periods and nearest GFP cluster is below
that expected for a random distribution.
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Clustered receptors display two levels of lateral mobility
We further analyzed the movement of mGluR5 clusters in neurons
through time-lapse recordings of mGluR5-myc-GFP fluorescence. We
performed tracking of the movement of GFP clusters in neurites, where
most of them reveal movement of surface clusters (Fig.
8A). These experiments
revealed that clusters fell in two categories exhibiting fast and slow
diffusion coefficients, ranging from 10 7
µm2/sec for the most immobile clusters
up to 5 × 10 2
µm2/sec for the fastest clusters.
Interestingly, these values span a similar range as that of the values
of the asymptotic diffusion coefficients measured on confined events
with SPT.

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Figure 8.
mGluR5-GFP clusters diffuse in the plasma
membrane. A, Time-lapse images of epifluorescence of a
neuron cotransfected with mGluR5-GFP and Homer1b. Sample time, 25 sec.
The movement of a diffusing cluster is highlighted by the
arrows, with the corresponding trajectory in
B. C, Plot of the distribution of the
cluster diffusion coefficients computed from tracks of images as in
A. D, Plot of the distribution of the
asymptotic diffusion coefficients measured on MSD plots during confined
events in SPT experiments performed on neurons coexpressing mGluR5-myc
and Homer1b. E, F, Analysis of the minimum force
required to drag receptors in the plane of the membrane in the confined
and diffusive states. Note that diffusive receptors require a minimal
force to be dragged, whereas confined receptors can be either
immobilized or dragged by an intermediate force.
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The heterogeneity in cluster movement could arise from differential
binding to rigid structures such as cytoskeletal elements. To test this
hypothesis directly, we returned to SPT and measured the force
necessary to drag the receptors in the plane of the membrane with laser
tweezers during the different stages of movement in cells coexpressing
mGluR5-myc and Homer1b-GFP (Fig. 8E,F). During
periods of free diffusion, receptors could be dragged freely over large
distances by applying a 1 pN dragging force on the bead in 78% of the
trials (n = 64). In contrast, during periods of reduced
diffusion, a large fraction (44%; n = 25) of receptors could not be dragged, even with forces of >12 pN. This indicates that
these receptors are bound to a rigid structure. Interestingly, there
remained a population of receptors that could be dragged by
intermediate forces (F = 5.1 ± 0.77 pN;
n = 14), although their lateral diffusion coefficient
was low. These data indicate that receptors in a confined state can be
either anchored or not to a rigid structure. These two states could
correspond to the two different states of mobility visualized through
fluorescence tracking of mGluR5-myc-GFP.
Fast reversibility of receptor clustering is confirmed by FRAP
So far, our SPT experiments strongly suggest that receptors can go
in and out of clusters. To circumvent possible artifacts caused by the
presence of the bead, we decided to test this hypothesis further using
a totally different approach. The principle of FRAP is to photobleach a
small area and measure its fluorescence continuously. The speed of
return of fluorescence in the bleached area is a direct estimate of the
diffusion coefficient of diffusive receptors, whereas the fraction of
recovery is an indication of the fraction of mobile receptors. FRAP was
performed on neurons cotransfected with mGluR5-GFP and Homer1b. We
selected two types of regions, containing predominantly either
scattered or clustered receptors. Fluorescence recovery was slower when
the receptors contained in the measured region were clustered than when
they were scattered (Fig. 9;
p < 0.001). These slower recovery times translate into lower diffusion coefficients for receptors in clusters
(D = 0.04 ± 0.01 µm2/sec) than for those scattered
(D = 0.11 ± 0.02 µm2/sec). Most interestingly, the
fraction of recovery was on the order of 50% for both types of
regions, indicating that the bleached clustered receptors could be
replaced within tens of seconds by unbleached ones. Derivation of
diffusion coefficients from FRAP and particle-tracking experiments led
to comparable results for diffusive receptors (0.09 and 0.11 µm2/sec, respectively). Data from
clustered receptors cannot be compared directly, because FRAP measures
reentry of receptors in clusters, whereas particle tracking measures
diffusion of the cluster. Incomplete recovery at this time scale could
be attributable to spatial limits within which receptors can diffuse,
thus limiting the pool of receptors available around the bleached spot
for repopulation. It could also arise from a less mobile population of
receptors that is replaced more slowly, for example, within the center
of the cluster, or both.

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Figure 9.
Reversibility of cluster composition visualized by
FRAP. A, B, Plots of the normalized fluorescence
intensity of mGluR5-GFP versus time before and after photobleaching
(vertical arrow), recorded in a region containing
scattered (A) or clustered
(B) receptors. The fluorescence intensity is
monitored on neurons cotransfected with mGluR5-GFP and Homer1b on a
2.1-µm-diameter region, as depicted by the white arrow
in the inset. Spots of clustered receptors are
identified as peaks on line scans of
fluorescence intensity (insets). The recoveries are
fitted with single exponentials to measure the half-recovery times, as
indicated. C, Histogram of mean half-recovery times for
regions containing scattered or clustered receptors. Note that recovery
is slower for clusters. D, Histogram of mean recovery
fractions for regions containing scattered or clustered receptors. Note
that clusters recover to the same extent as scattered receptors.
***p < 0.001.
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DISCUSSION |
mGluR5-myc alternates between periods of fast and slow diffusion.
Activation of mGluR5 increases overall receptor diffusion without
affecting the balance between its different mobility states, whereas
the mGluR5-interacting protein Homer increases the residency time in
the slow diffusion state. Combination of fluorescence imaging of
mGluR5-GFP or Homer with SPT indicates that confined states correspond
most to receptors being associated with mGluR5-Homer clusters. Taken
together, FRAP and SPT experiments show that the composition of
receptor clusters is in continuous renewal.
Physiological regulation of mGluR5 states of mobility
mGluR5 alternated between states of different mobility. Receptors
in a state of free Brownian diffusion displayed a low confinement index
and a linear MSD function and could be dragged by forces of <1 pN for
distances over several micrometers. This agrees with the notion that
during free diffusion, receptor movement is only limited by viscous
forces. It indicates that diffusive movements of mGluR5 during these
periods are not restricted by membrane fences (Kusumi et al., 1993 ;
Simson et al., 1998 ). During periods of reduced diffusion detected by a
high confinement index, the MSD function was negatively curved,
independently confirming that diffusion was restricted ("confined")
to submembranous areas.
Two physiological processes regulate mGluR5 mobility. First, activation
of the receptor with the group I mGluR agonist DHPG tripled the
diffusion coefficient in the mobile and confined states. In contrast,
the time spent in each state did not vary. It is thus unlikely that
mGluR activation regulates specific interaction with stabilizing
intracellular partners. Rather, activation-induced uncoupling of
Gq from mGluR5 (De Blasi et al., 2001 ) could
promote lateral mobility of mGluR5 by alleviating steric hindrance
during passive interactions with submembranous material such as
cytoskeletal elements (Simson et al., 1998 ).
Second, interaction of mGluR5 with Homer modifies the equilibrium
between states toward a higher residency time in the confined state.
The mGluR5-Homer1b interaction at the cell surface was visualized both
by the appearance of clusters of mGluR5 in which Homer1b and mGluR5
colocalized and by a 30% (in neurons) to 70% (in Ptk2 cells) increase
in the percentage of time spent by mGluR5 in the confined state.
Interestingly, in the presence of Homer1b, mGluR5 still alternated
frequently between periods of confinement and free diffusion. A large
proportion of the confined periods likely correspond to receptors
physically associated with clusters of Homer1b-mGluR5. The diffusive
periods would correspond to receptors scattered in the membrane. An
intriguing question is the nature of the confined state in the absence
of transfected Homer1b. In neurons, periods of reduced diffusion could
be attributable to interaction with endogenous Homer. They were,
however, still observed with Homer1a, which is supposed to
compete for full-length Homer-mGluR5 interaction, and when the Homer
interaction site was deleted in mGluR5. In Ptk2 cells, where Homer is
undetectable, mGluR5, as its tail-minus mutant, still displayed
confined episodes for 25-30% of the total time. Thus, this fraction
of periods of confinement independent of Homer may correspond to
low-affinity binding of mGluR5 to an unidentified molecule or to
nonspecific corralling of receptor movement by membrane subdomains or
cytoskeleton fences (Sako and Kusumi, 1994 ).
Dynamics of clustered receptors
Several arguments support the notion that clusters of receptors
have a dynamic composition on the time scale of seconds, although their
apparent size appears constant. First, in SPT experiments, we
visualized receptors exchanging between adjacent clusters and repetitive binding and unbinding from the periphery of a cluster. Second, FRAP experiments demonstrated that fluorescence of bleached mGluR5 clusters recovered within tens of seconds, showing that receptors repopulate these clusters rapidly.
Large variability was observed in the mobility and resistance to
dragging of clusters as a whole by converging fluorescence, SPT, and
force measurements. This suggests that they have different states of
binding to rigid structures. They may float freely in the membrane,
displaying diffusion rates reaching nearly that of scattered receptors,
as predicted by the theory of Saffman (1976) . Clusters may also be
immobilized through binding to rigid structures. mGluR5 might be bound
to actin through the N-terminal domain of Homer1b (Shiraishi et al.,
1999 ) or directly to microtubules as for mGluR1 (Ciruela et al.,
1999 ).
Movement of receptors during confined events is restricted either by
obstacles or within a membrane subdomain (Kusumi et al., 1993 ; Simson
et al., 1998 ). Within the latter hypothesis, the slope of the asymptote
gives the lateral diffusion rate of the subdomain, whereas the
instantaneous diffusion coefficient (slope of the MSD at the origin)
gives the diffusion rate of the receptor within the subdomain. Two sets
of data support our hypothesis that the asymptotic diffusion
coefficient measured on the MSD plots corresponds to the lateral
diffusion of clusters. First, on occasions, we could correlate drift of
Homer1b-GFP clusters and movement of confinement domains. Second, we
observed that the range of asymptotic diffusion rates matches that
measured by fluorescence of mGluR5-GFP clusters. The instantaneous
diffusion could correspond to diffusion of receptors within the cluster or to a rotational diffusion of the clustered receptors. Indeed, some
confined parts of trajectories clearly depict rotational diffusion
(data not shown), as would be expected for a particle situated at the
boundary of a semirigid disk diffusing in the membrane. Altogether, we
propose that the movement of scattered receptors is Brownian, whereas
clustered receptors move as a semirigid disk floating in the membrane.
This movement is the sum of rotational and translational diffusion.
Role of receptor dynamics in physiology
Similar dynamic properties and regulation by Homer were observed
in Ptk2 cells and in neurons cultured for 2 d. In both cases, there are no synapses; therefore antibody-coated beads have access to
all surface receptors. In neurons cultured for 7 d, synaptogenesis has started, but we observed similar behavior of mGluR5. Our
measurements thus probably provide good estimates of the parameters of
extrasynaptic receptor movements. In the absence of direct
measurements, we do not know what is the actual residency time, i.e.,
affinity, of mGluR5 at synaptic sites. Furthermore, we have not been
able to perform experiments in older, more mature neurons, which may display different membrane properties. However, we show that, if freed
from the synapse, receptors will diffuse rapidly in the extrasynaptic
membrane until they find another binding site.
In our cotransfection experiments, we have formed domains enriched in
mGluR5, which resembles the situation of the postsynaptic membrane.
That receptors are not irreversibly trapped in these domains but can
escape from them by lateral diffusion is of importance to understand
how receptor clusters are formed and modified in plastic processes.
Although mGluR5 is enriched at postsynaptic sites to an annulus
surrounding the PSD (Baude et al., 1993 ; Nusser et al., 1994 ), up to
75% of the receptors can be found at nonsynaptic sites (Lujan et al.,
1997 ). This distribution can be interpreted as mGluR5 being in a
dynamic equilibrium between a freely diffusive state outside the
synapse and an immobilized state at synaptic sites, bound to Homer or
other scaffold proteins. Recent results indicated that the synaptic
localization of Homer is regulated within minutes by calcium influx
through NMDA receptors (Okabe et al., 2001 ). This can potentially
modify the residence time, and thus the number, of mGluR5 at synapses.
That clusters are relatively mobile is relevant to addressing receptors
to synaptic sites. Receptors can be addressed and inserted in the
membrane at sites remote from the cell body after intracellular
trafficking along neurites (for review, see Craig and Boudin, 2001 ).
Alternatively, receptors could be inserted in the somatic membrane and
then diffuse laterally in the plasma membrane of neurites until trapped
at remote synaptic sites by interaction with scaffolding proteins. Such
a diffusion-trap mechanism, proposed for the building of ACh receptors
at the neuromuscular junction (Young and Poo, 1983 ; Akaaboune et al.,
1999 ), was also shown at central inhibitory (Rosenberg et al., 2001 )
and excitatory (Passafaro et al., 2001 ) synapses. Thus mGluR5 could be
trafficked far away in neurites through lateral diffusion, even when it
is clustered with Homer.
We recently showed that glycine receptors (GlyRs) are reversibly
stabilized by the scaffolding protein gephyrin (Meier et al., 2001 ).
The diffusion of mGluR5 in both the scattered and clustered states is
approximately five times faster than that of GlyRs in the corresponding
states. By contrast, mGluR5 spends more time in the confined state in
the presence of Homer1b than does GlyR in the presence of gephyrin.
Thus, rates of diffusion and probability of confinement are not
directly related. Despite these quantitative differences, we propose as
a general rule that receptor-scaffold protein interactions are
reversible on a short time scale, and this property is relevant to the
plasticity of the composition of the postsynaptic density. The number
of receptors present in the postsynaptic density at a given time will
be directly related to the residence time of the receptors at that
location. Although few extrasynaptic receptors may exist at a given
time point, any receptor may enter a diffusive state within a short period and thus travel long distances. This allows receptors to exchange rapidly between regional specializations such as synapses and
to enter processes likely to occur only outside the synapse. Receptors
freed from synaptic confinement might therefore (1) be exchanged
between synapses, thus changing the number of receptors in a synaptic
cluster, and (2) diffuse away from postsynaptic densities to enter the
endocytotic pathway, thus contributing to turnover. Changes in either
the number of stabilizing molecules or their affinity for receptors
would regulate these transitions. Such mechanisms can operate in
synaptogenesis and synaptic plasticity.
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FOOTNOTES |
Received Aug. 27, 2001; revised Jan. 22, 2002; accepted Feb. 12, 2002.
This work was supported by grants from the Centre National de la
Recherche Scientifique, the Fondation pour la Recherche Médicale, the Association Française contre les Myopathies, and the council of the Région Aquitaine. We thank J. P. Pin and P. Worley
for the gifts of mGluR5 and Homer cDNAs, P. Worley for the gift of pan
anti-Homer antibody, C. Mulle, D. P. Felsenfeld, and A. Borgdorff for critical reading of this manuscript, F. Coussen for assistance in
molecular biology, and F. Rossignol and P. Gonzales for cell cultures.
Correspondence should be addressed to Daniel Choquet, Physiologie
Cellulaire de la Synapse, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique,
Unité Mixte de Recherche 5091, Institut Magendie, rue Camille
Saint Saëns, 33077 Bordeaux Cedex, France. E-mail: dchoquet{at}u-bordeaux2.fr.
 |
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