Image of the Week - 28 September 2004

Proposed role for the Fragile X Mental Retardation Protein (FMRP) in Neurons

Research from Dr. William Greenough's lab indicates that FMRP helps regulate the synthesis of other important proteins at synapses in response to neurotransmitter signaling. When FMRP is absent, as occurs in patients with Fragile X Mental Retardation Syndrome, translational regulation is impaired.This impairment may contribute to some of the cognitive and behavioral symptoms of patients with Fragile X Syndrome. This image was created using Adobe Illustrator by Mark Flider from hand-drawn sketches by Aaron Grossman. Mark is a creative consultant for the Imaging Technology Group and can give assistance with both 2D and 3D rendering.

Image Courtesy: Image Courtesy: Aaron Grossman, Dr. William T. Greenough, Ivan Jeanne Weiler, Soong Ho Kim, Mark Flider

Contact: awgrossm@uiuc.edu, wgreenou@uiuc.edu, mflider@uiuc.edu