{"doi":"10.1093/cercor/bhab399","title":"Abnormal whisker-dependent behaviors and altered cortico-hippocampal connectivity in <i>Shank3b</i> −/− mice","abstract":"Abnormal tactile response is an integral feature of Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASDs), and hypo-responsiveness to tactile stimuli is often associated with the severity of ASDs core symptoms. Patients with Phelan-McDermid syndrome (PMS), caused by mutations in the SHANK3 gene, show ASD-like symptoms associated with aberrant tactile responses. The neural underpinnings of these abnormalities are still poorly understood. Here we investigated, in Shank3b-/- adult mice, the neural substrates of whisker-guided behaviors, a key component of rodents' interaction with the surrounding environment. We assessed whisker-dependent behaviors in Shank3b-/- adult mice and age-matched controls, using the textured novel object recognition (tNORT) and whisker nuisance (WN) test. Shank3b-/- mice showed deficits in whisker-dependent texture discrimination in tNORT and behavioral hypo-responsiveness to repetitive whisker stimulation in WN. Sensory hypo-responsiveness was accompanied by a significantly reduced activation of the primary somatosensory cortex (S1) and hippocampus, as measured by c-fos mRNA induction, a proxy of neuronal activity following whisker stimulation. Moreover, resting-state fMRI showed a significantly reduced S1-hippocampal connectivity in Shank3b mutants, in the absence of altered connectivity between S1 and other somatosensory areas. Impaired crosstalk between hippocampus and S1 might underlie Shank3b-/- hypo-reactivity to whisker-dependent cues, highlighting a potentially generalizable somatosensory dysfunction in ASD.","journal":"Cerebral Cortex","year":2021,"id":157314,"datarank":0.0,"base_score":0.0,"endowment":0.0,"self_citation_contribution":0.0,"citation_network_contribution":0.0,"self_endowment_contribution":0.0,"citer_contribution":0.0,"corpus_percentile":null,"corpus_rank":null,"citation_count":51,"citer_count":0,"citers_with_citation_signal":0,"citers_with_endowment":0,"datacite_reuse_total":0,"is_dataset":false,"is_dataset_confidence":0.9466,"is_data_producer":false,"deposit_databanks":null,"is_oa":true,"file_count":0,"downloads":0,"has_version_chain":false,"published_date":"2021-01-01","fair_score":null,"fair_percentile":null,"algorithm_id":"datarank_citation_only_1hop_v6","ranking_scope":"data_only","authors":[{"id":268795,"name":"Marco Pagani","orcid":"0000-0002-6052-6931","position":1,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":663799,"name":"Luca Pangrazzi","orcid":"0000-0003-0673-4577","position":2,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":283100,"name":"Gabriele Chelini","orcid":"0000-0001-6654-4332","position":3,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":664332,"name":"Alessandra Georgette Ciancone Chama","orcid":null,"position":4,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":664333,"name":"Evgenia Shlosman","orcid":null,"position":5,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":663800,"name":"Lorenzo Mattioni","orcid":"0000-0003-1255-8354","position":6,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":484256,"name":"Alberto Galbusera","orcid":"0000-0001-7213-0013","position":7,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":249864,"name":"Giuliano Iurilli","orcid":"0000-0001-9037-2489","position":8,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":555756,"name":"Giovanni Provenzano","orcid":"0000-0001-7160-4184","position":9,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":268774,"name":"Alessandro Gozzi","orcid":"0000-0002-5731-4137","position":10,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":555755,"name":"Yuri Bozzi","orcid":"0000-0002-1496-9889","position":11,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":663798,"name":"Luigi Balasco","orcid":"0000-0002-5750-8505","position":0,"is_corresponding":true}],"reference_count":53,"raw_metadata":null,"created_at":"2026-07-18T23:44:17.471040Z","pmid":"34791077","pmcid":null,"fwci":null,"citation_percentile":null,"influential_citations":0,"oa_status":null,"license":null,"views":0,"total_file_size_bytes":0,"version_count":0,"fair_f":null,"fair_a":null,"fair_i":null,"fair_r":null,"fair_zscore":null,"fair_rationale":null,"fair_model":null,"fair_agent_version":null,"fair_fulltext_source":null,"fair_has_llm":null,"fair_computed_at":null,"clinical_trials":[],"software_tools":[],"db_accessions":[],"linked_datasets":[],"topics":[]}