{"doi":"10.1101/2022.01.11.475883","title":"Dendritic branch structure compartmentalizes voltage-dependent calcium influx in cortical layer 2/3 pyramidal cells","abstract":"Abstract Back-propagating action potentials (bAPs) regulate synaptic plasticity by evoking voltage-dependent calcium influx throughout dendrites. Attenuation of bAP amplitude in distal dendritic compartments alters plasticity in a location-specific manner by reducing bAP-dependent calcium influx. However, it is not known if neurons exhibit branch-specific variability in bAP-dependent calcium signals, independent of distance-dependent attenuation. Here, we reveal that bAPs fail to evoke calcium influx through voltage-gated calcium channels (VGCCs) in a specific population of dendritic branches in cortical layer 2/3 pyramidal cells, despite evoking substantial VGCC-mediated calcium influx in sister branches. These branches contain VGCCs and successfully propagate bAPs in the absence of synaptic input; nevertheless, they fail to exhibit bAP-evoked calcium influx due to a branch-specific reduction in bAP amplitude. We demonstrate that these branches have more elaborate branch structure compared to sister branches, which causes a local reduction in electrotonic impedance and bAP amplitude. Finally, we show that bAPs still amplify synaptically-mediated calcium influx in these branches because of differences in the voltage-dependence and kinetics of VGCCs and NMDA-type glutamate receptors. Branch-specific compartmentalization of bAP-dependent calcium signals may provide a mechanism for neurons to diversify synaptic tuning across the dendritic tree.","journal":"bioRxiv (Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory)","year":2022,"id":305442,"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":0,"citer_count":0,"citers_with_citation_signal":0,"citers_with_endowment":0,"datacite_reuse_total":0,"is_dataset":false,"is_dataset_confidence":0.9524,"is_data_producer":false,"deposit_databanks":null,"is_oa":true,"file_count":0,"downloads":0,"has_version_chain":false,"published_date":"2022-01-01","fair_score":null,"fair_percentile":null,"algorithm_id":"datarank_citation_only_1hop_v6","ranking_scope":"data_only","authors":[{"id":806838,"name":"Pojeong Park","orcid":"0000-0002-5574-6104","position":1,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":807433,"name":"J. David Wong-Campos","orcid":null,"position":2,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":656787,"name":"He Tian","orcid":"0000-0003-3282-7275","position":3,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":253698,"name":"Adam E. Cohen","orcid":"0000-0002-8699-2404","position":4,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":250395,"name":"Bernardo L. Sabatini","orcid":"0000-0003-0095-9177","position":5,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":999325,"name":"Andrew T. Landau","orcid":"0000-0001-9105-1636","position":0,"is_corresponding":true}],"reference_count":59,"raw_metadata":null,"created_at":"2026-07-19T00:32:41.290883Z","pmid":null,"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":[]}