Cells have surface receptors that couple to proteins and other molecules to initiate or inhibit certain behaviors. Typically, the number of these receptors increases as the cell matures, but researchers have now identified that one receptor influences cell behavior much earlier than previously thought and appears to help trigger the cell differentiation process to form neurons.

The Hiroshima University-based team published their work, which they said has implications for better understanding neuronal development and brain plasticity — and how those processes become dysregulated — on March 20 in iScience. They specifically found that G protein-coupled receptor 3 (GPR3) represents a unique molecule in this receptor family, as it behaves like an immediate-early gene that rapidly responds and induces downstream signaling. Other G protein-coupled receptors behave like delayed-response genes that aren’t expressed into much later in the cell maturation process.

Understanding early transcriptional responses — how genes are expressed in response to upstream signals — is critical because these programs determine neuronal development, synaptic formation and plasticity, and their dysregulation is associated with neurological disorders such as autism and cognitive dysfunction.