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Persistence of vestibular function in the absence of glutamatergic transmission from hair cells.

Overview

Authors: Mohona Mukhopadhyay1, Ruchi Modgekar1,2, Aizhen Yang-Hood3, Kevin K Ohlemiller3, Valentin Militchin3, Maolei Xiao3, Zhijun Shen3, Nicholas R Rensing4, Michael Wong4, Suh Jin Lee5, Rebecca P Seal5, Joseph C Holt6, Mark E Warchol3, Susan E Maloney7,8, Carla M Yuede7,8, Mark A Rutherford3, Tina Pangrsic1,9,10,11
ORCID iDs: Suh Jin Lee
  1. Experimental Otology Group, InnerEarLab, Department of Otolaryngology, Institute for Auditory Neuroscience, University Medical Center Göttingen, Göttingen, Germany
  2. International Max Planck Research School (IMPRS) for Neuroscience, Göttingen, Germany
  3. Department of Otolaryngology – Head and Neck Surgery, Washington University School of Medicine, St. Louis, MO USA
  4. Department of Neurology, Washington University School of Medicine, St. Louis, MO USA
  5. Departments of Neurobiology and Otolaryngology, Pittsburgh Center for Pain Research, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA USA
  6. Department of Otolaryngology, Department of Neuroscience, University of Rochester, Rochester, NY USA
  7. Department of Psychiatry, Washington University School of Medicine, St. Louis, MO USA
  8. Intellectual and Developmental Disability Research Center, Washington University School of Medicine, St. Louis, MO USA
  9. Institute for Auditory Neuroscience, Auditory Neuroscience Group, Max Planck Institute for Multidisciplinary Sciences, Göttingen, Germany
  10. Collaborative Research Center 889, University of Göttingen, Göttingen, Germany
  11. Multiscale Bioimaging Cluster of Excellence (MBExC), University of Göttingen, Göttingen, Germany
Journal: Scientific reports, volume 16, issue 1, article 14550
Dates: received 18 November 2025; accepted 6 March 2026; published online 23 March 2026
Type: Research article · Language: English
License: CC BY
Identifiers: DOI 10.1038/s41598-026-43836-7 · PMID 41866362 · PMCID PMC13153426 · OpenAlex W7140024307
Open access: gold, a free copy (OpenAlex)
Categories: intracellular / patch clamp (modality), mouse (organism), cellular / molecular (subfield)
Methods: Statistics, Single-unit activity, calcium imaging, Physiology & signal measures
Keywords: Balance, Calyx, EPSC, Glutamate, Non-quantal and quantal synaptic transmission, Neuroscience, Physiology
MeSH: Amino Acid Transport Systems, Acidic*, Glutamic Acid*, Hair Cells, Vestibular*, Synaptic Transmission*, Vestibule, Labyrinth*, Animals, Mice, Mice, Knockout, Vestibular Nerve (* major topic)
Topic: Hearing, Cochlea, Tinnitus, Genetics (Sensory Systems, Neuroscience), according to OpenAlex
Funding: Georg-August-Universität Göttingen
Citations: cited by 5 papers (Europe PMC); 106 references in the paper
Research resources: RRID AB_2721321) and Neurofilament H RRID:AB_1005601, RRID:AB_2148626, goat anti-Vglut3 RRID:AB_2187701, rabbit anti-Vglut1 RRID:AB_887875, rabbit anti-Vglut2 RRID:AB_887883, RRID:IMSR_JAX:000664, RRID:IMSR_JAX:004682

Abstract

Quantal synaptic transmission in vestibular endorgans is glutamatergic. Here, we investigated the vestibular phenotype of deaf Vglut3−/− (Slc17a8−/−) mice from the cellular to behavioral levels. In Vglut3−/− mice, quantal synaptic transmission in utricular calyces was reduced in rate and amplitude by > 95%. In vivo recordings of spontaneous activity in the vestibular nerve revealed no significant effect of VGLUT3 deletion on afferent rate and regularity, suggesting a divergent underlying mechanism compared to the silent Vglut3−/− auditory nerve. In behavioral studies, Vglut3−/− mice did not exhibit considerable sensorimotor or balance deficits. Type-II vestibular hair cells (VHCs) in Vglut3+/+ mice were strongly immunoreactive for VGLUT3, while type-I VHCs showed weak immunoreactivity. Collectively, these data support the view that non-quantal transmission is the predominant mode of neurotransmission between type-I VHCs and vestibular calyceal afferent neurons. We propose that non-quantal transmission is sufficient to support vestibular nerve physiology and behavioral function in Vglut3−/− mice.

Supplementary Information: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1038/s41598-026-43836-7.

Reproduced under the paper's license (CC BY), from the paper cited above.

Code

The paper links to its data and to no code of its authors: see the Data section.

Tracing map

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Data

Datasets cited

Data availability

All datasets are available from the corresponding authors upon request. Vglut1 and 2 mRNA expression data in Supplemental Figure 2a is available at gEAR (https://umgear.org/), GEO ID GSE115934 (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/geo/query/acc.cgi?acc=GSE115934).

Reproduced under the paper's license (CC BY), from the paper cited above.

Versions

The history of this record: each version stored by the harvester or made by a correction of its authors or of the maintainers of its code, and what changed in its facts. The texts of the paper (its abstract, its availability statements) are not part of it; versions that changed only those are not listed.

Version 1, 30 September 2026: the first record

Recorded: type, language, journal, volume, issue, pages, dates, 17 authors, 7 keywords, 9 MeSH terms, 1 funder, 105 references, 7 RRIDs.

Cite

This paper

Mukhopadhyay, M., Modgekar, R., Yang-Hood, A., Ohlemiller, K. K., Militchin, V., Xiao, M., Shen, Z., Rensing, N. R., Wong, M., Lee, S. J., Seal, R. P., Holt, J. C., Warchol, M. E., Maloney, S. E., Yuede, C. M., Rutherford, M. A., & Pangrsic, T. (2026). Persistence of vestibular function in the absence of glutamatergic transmission from hair cells. Scientific reports, 16(1), 14550. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-026-43836-7

BibTeX

@article{mukhopadhyay2026persistence,
author = {Mukhopadhyay, Mohona and Modgekar, Ruchi and Yang-Hood, Aizhen and Ohlemiller, Kevin K and Militchin, Valentin and Xiao, Maolei and Shen, Zhijun and Rensing, Nicholas R and Wong, Michael and Lee, Suh Jin and Seal, Rebecca P and Holt, Joseph C and Warchol, Mark E and Maloney, Susan E and Yuede, Carla M and Rutherford, Mark A and Pangrsic, Tina},
title = {{Persistence of vestibular function in the absence of glutamatergic transmission from hair cells}},
journal = {Scientific reports},
year = {2026},
month = mar,
volume = {16},
number = {1},
pages = {14550},
publisher = {Nature Publishing Group},
issn = {2045-2322},
doi = {10.1038/s41598-026-43836-7},
url = {https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-026-43836-7},
pmid = {41866362},
pmcid = {PMC13153426}
}

RIS

TY - JOUR
AU - Mukhopadhyay, Mohona
AU - Modgekar, Ruchi
AU - Yang-Hood, Aizhen
AU - Ohlemiller, Kevin K
AU - Militchin, Valentin
AU - Xiao, Maolei
AU - Shen, Zhijun
AU - Rensing, Nicholas R
AU - Wong, Michael
AU - Lee, Suh Jin
AU - Seal, Rebecca P
AU - Holt, Joseph C
AU - Warchol, Mark E
AU - Maloney, Susan E
AU - Yuede, Carla M
AU - Rutherford, Mark A
AU - Pangrsic, Tina
TI - Persistence of vestibular function in the absence of glutamatergic transmission from hair cells
T2 - Scientific reports
J2 - Sci Rep
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/03/23
VL - 16
IS - 1
SP - 14550
SN - 2045-2322
PB - Nature Publishing Group
DO - 10.1038/s41598-026-43836-7
UR - https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-026-43836-7
LA - en
ER -

CSL-JSON

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