Hormones and Synapse

Dr. Gerald Litwack obtained M.S. and PhD degrees from the University of Wisconsin Department of Biochemistry and remained there for a brief time as a Lecturer on Enzymes. Then he entered the Biochemical Institute of the Sorbonne as a Fellow of the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis. He next moved to Rutgers University as an Assistant Professor of Biochemistry and later as Associate Professor of biochemistry at the University of Pennsylvania Graduate School of Medicine. After four years he moved to the Temple University School of Medicine as Professor of Biochemistry and Deputy Director of the Fels Institute for Cancer Research and Molecular Biology, soon after, becoming the Laura H. Carnell Professor. Subsequently he was appointed chair of Biochemistry and Molecular Pharmacology at the Jefferson Medical College as well as Vice Dean for Research and Deputy Director of the Jefferson Cancer Institute and Director of the Institute for Apoptosis. Following the move of his family, he became a Visiting Scholar at the Department of Biological Chemistry of the Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA and then became the Founding Chair of the Department of Basic Sciences at the Geisinger Commonwealth School of Medicine, becoming Professor of Molecular and Cellular Medicine and Associate Director of the Institute for Regenerative Medicine at the Texas A&M Health Science Center as his final position. During his career he was a visiting scientist at the University of California, San Francisco and Berkeley, Courtauld Institute of Biochemistry, London and the Wistar Institute. He was appointed Emeritus Professor and/or Chair at Rutgers University, Thomas Jefferson University and the Geisinger Commonwealth School of Medicine. He has published more than 300 scientific papers, authored three textbooks and edited more than sixty-five books. Currently he lives with his family and continues his authorship and editorial work in Los Angeles.

1. Evolutionary origins of chemical synapsesSaak V. Ovsepian, Valerie B. O'Leary and Nikolai P. Vesselkin

2. Ultrastructural and molecular features of excitatory and glutamatergic synapses. The auditory nerve synapsesMaría E. Rubio

3. Corticotropin releasing factor modulates excitatory synaptic transmissionNeal Joshi, Michael Aree and Daniel Chandler

4. Neurotrophin-3 modulates synaptic transmissionElizabeth Hernández-Echeagaray

5. Growth hormone (GH) and synaptogenesisCarlos G. Martínez-Moreno and Carlos Arámburo

6. Neural sex steroids and hippocampal synaptic plasticityN. Brandt, L. Fester and G.M. Rune

7. Sex hormones and proteins involved in brain plasticityIgnacio Camacho-Arroyo, Ana Gabriela Piña-Medina, Claudia Bello-Alvarez and Carmen Janín Zamora-Sánchez

8. Synaptic effects of estrogenKate Nicholson, Neil J. MacLusky and Csaba Leranth

9. Estrogen receptor signaling through metabotropic glutamate receptorsKellie S. Gross and Paul G. Mermelstein

10. Estradiol induces synaptic rearrangementsIvana Grkovic and Natasa Mitrovic

11. Stress and remodeling of hippocampal spine synapsesTibor Hajszan

12. Brain insulin resistance impairs hippocampal plasticityMatteo Spinelli, Salvatore Fusco and Claudio Grassi

13. A potential role for dendritic spines in bisphenol-A induced memory impairments during adolescence and adulthoodMaya Frankfurt, Victoria Luine and Rachel E. Bowman