Original Research Article
Comprehensive behavioral phenotyping of ryanodine receptor type3 (RyR3) knockout mice: Decreased social contact duration in two social interaction tests
Naoki Matsuo 1, 2, Koichi Tanda 3, 4, Kazuo Nakanishi 3, Nobuyuki Yamasaki 3, 5, Keiko Toyama 1, 2, Keizo Takao 1, 2, 3, Hiroshi Takeshima 7 and Tsuyoshi Miyakawa 1, 2, 3*
1
Division of Systems Medical Science, Institute for Comprehensive Medical Science, Fujita Health University, Japan
2
Core Research for Evolutional Science and Technology (CREST), Japan Science and Technology Agency, Japan
3
Genetic Engineering and Functional Group, Frontier Technology Center, Graduate School of Medicine, Kyoto University, Japan
4
Department of Pediatrics, Kyoto Prefectural University of Medicine, Japan
5
Department of Psychiatry, Graduate School of Medicine, Kyoto University, Japan
6
Graduate School of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Department of Biologocal Chemistry, Kyoto University, Japan
7
Institute for Bioinformatics Research and Development (BIRD), Japan Science and Technology Agency, Japan
Dynamic regulation of the intracellular Ca2+ concentration is crucial for various neuronal functions such as synaptic transmission and plasticity, and gene expression. Ryanodine receptors (RyRs) are a family of intracellular calcium release channels that mediate calcium-induced calcium release (CICR) from the endoplasmic reticulum. Among the three RyR isoforms, RyR3 is preferentially expressed in the brain especially in the hippocampus and striatum. To investigate the behavioral effects of RyR3 deficiency, we subjected RyR3 knockout (RyR3-/-) mice to a battery of behavioral tests. RyR3-/- mice exhibited significantly decreased social contact duration in two different social interaction tests, where two mice can freely move and make contacts with each other. They also exhibited hyperactivity and mildly impaired prepulse inhibition and latent inhibition while they did not show significant abnormalities in motor function and working and reference memory tests. These results suggest that RyR3 has an important role in locomotor activity and social behavior.
