ABSTRACT
Epilepsy models in rodents include the administration of repeated electrical stimulation or chemoconvulsant drugs to induce seizures. Perhaps one of the strongest validations for the use of Drosophila seizure mutants for the study of epilepsy is the fact that clinically-relevant anti-epileptic drugs are able to suppress seizures in the fly. The ability to perform unbiased genetic screens in seizure-sensitive Drosophila mutants provides a powerful approach to identify gene products that either contribute to, or ameliorate, seizure. Drosophila motoneurons, subjected to altered synaptic excitation, similarly adjust their membrane excitability, again through changes in voltage-gated sodium conductance. The chapter reviews the subject of neuronal homeostasis both in vertebrates and invertebrates, and integrates this knowledge with observations regarding seizure susceptibility. Using the sophisticated genetic tools available in Drosophila, Hekmat-Scafe et al. have described both the developmental stage and neuronal population most effective for esg expression in the reduction of seizure.
