Neuroscientists discover molecular mechanism that allows memories to form (2020)

Original article here (paywalled): https://www.nature.com/articles/s41593-020-00717-0

I wonder what the significance of this mechanism vs long term potentiation (LTP) is. Any insights?

Just reading the abstract, is it me, or did the authors revel in spewing a ridiculous amount of jargon instead of using the opportunity to give a simple and clear statement of the fundamental finding of the work to a general scientific audience?

"The epigenome and three-dimensional (3D) genomic architecture are emerging as key factors in the dynamic regulation of different transcriptional programs required for neuronal functions. In this study, we used an activity-dependent tagging system in mice to determine the epigenetic state, 3D genome architecture and transcriptional landscape of engram cells over the lifespan of memory formation and recall. Our findings reveal that memory encoding leads to an epigenetic priming event, marked by increased accessibility of enhancers without the corresponding transcriptional changes. Memory consolidation subsequently results in spatial reorganization of large chromatin segments and promoter–enhancer interactions. Finally, with reactivation, engram neurons use a subset of de novo long-range interactions, where primed enhancers are brought in contact with their respective promoters to upregulate genes involved in local protein translation in synaptic compartments. Collectively, our work elucidates the comprehensive transcriptional and epigenomic landscape across the lifespan of memory formation and recall in the hippocampal engram ensemble."

I think back to a historical abstract:

"We wish to suggest a structure for the salt of deoxyribose nucleic acid (D.N.A.). This structure has novel features which are of considerable biological interest."

this particular kind of interaction would not be transmissible. Some other mechanisms, such as DNA methylation or miRNA may be though.

Nature journals have strict structural requirements for submitted abstracts.

And unfortunately, because this was Nature Neuroscience, the intended audience is more specific, which is why you see more jargon there.

Here is an extracted example from the latest issue of Science, for which the intended audience is more general:

Psychotic disorders such as schizophrenia impose enormous human, social, and economic burdens. The prognosis of psychotic disorders has not substantially improved over the past decades because our understanding of the underlying neurobiology has remained stagnant. Indeed, the subjective nature of hallucinations, a defining symptom of psychosis, presents an enduring challenge for their rigorous study in humans and translation to preclinical animal models. Here, we developed a cross-species computational psychiatry approach to directly relate human and rodent behavior and used this approach to study the neural basis of hallucination-like perception in mice.

https://science.sciencemag.org/content/372/6537/eabf4740

It’s not a perfect comparison because Science abstracts are apparently much larger (this is just the Intro!) but it does convey my point about language.