... of organisation are largely unknown. We have previously shown that the assembly of motor neurons into nuclei depends on cadherin-mediated adhesion. Here, we demonstrate that the emergence of mature topography among motor nuclei involves a novel interplay between spontaneous activity, cadherin expression and gap...

.... A., Sorra, K. A. and Harris, K. M. ( 1999 ). Slices have more synapses than perfusion-fixed hippocampus from both young and mature rats. J. Neurosci. 19 , 2876 -2886. Klostermann, O. and Wahle, P. ( 1999 ). Patterns of spontaneous activity and morphology of interneuron types in organotypic cortex...

..., including migration, neural differentiation and formation and refinement of connections. The mechanisms regulating spontaneous activity are not known. By using transgenic embryos that overexpress BDNF under the control of the nestin promoter, we show here that BDNF controls the emergence and robustness...