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. 2025 May 22;5(5):100537. doi: 10.1016/j.bpsgos.2025.100537

Figure 5.

Figure 5

Cortical network alterations in mice that overexpress CaV1.2. (A) Representative FOV in grayscale (left) and with pseudocolored ROIs (right). (B) Raw GCaMP6 signal before, during, and after tactile stimulation during a 50-second recording. (C) Network connectivity correlogram. The size of the dot (neuron) represents the sum of that neuron’s weighted CC with all other neurons. The color of the line between 2 dots indicates the unweighted CC between that pair of neurons. Recordings were made from 6 mice in each genotype (CaV1.2Tg− = 95 FOV; CaV1.2Tg+ = 143 FOV). (D) Mice that overexpressed CaV1.2 exhibited significantly more active neurons per mm2 than their WT littermate controls (t236 = 4.67, ∗∗∗∗p = .007; unpaired t test). (E) In addition to the increase in number of active neurons in the CaV1.2Tg+ mice, the number of active connections was greater than those observed in the CaV1.2Tg− mice both during stimulation and the recovery period (effect of genotype F1,708 = 15.06, #p = .0001, ∗∗p = .005, ∗p = .041; Sidak’s). (F) Connection lengths were overall shorter in the CaV1.2Tg+ mice (F1,256 = 14.52, #p = .0002; restricted maximum likelihood), which was most apparent during the baseline period (t256 = 2.65, ∗p = .026; Sidak’s). (G–I) In contrast to the presence of more densely connected neurons, network activity in the CaV1.2Tg+ mice appeared to be less synchronized during the stimulation period. (G) The average percentage of cells that were synchronized with the 3-Hz paw stimulation was ∼70% and was not different between the 2 genotypes. (H) The percentage of time that cells in the FOV were synchronized to the input frequency was modestly reduced in the CaV1.2Tg+ mice compared with their WT littermates (t236 = 2.49, ∗p = .0134; unpaired t test). (I) Similarly, overlapping events between pairs of cells in the CaV1.2Tg+ mice was significantly reduced (t148 = 3.01, ∗∗p = .0023; t test with Welch’s correction). (J) Lastly, network synchronicity during the 3-Hz stimulation (calculated as the number of consecutive events detected divided by 15 and presented as percentage of time) was modestly reduced in the CaV1.2Tg+ mice (t236 = 2.69, ∗∗p = .008; t test). All data are presented as mean ± SEM. CC, correlation coefficient; FOV, field of view; ROI, region of interest; WT, wild-type.