ABSTRACT
A comprehensive understanding of how sensorimotor experience shapes brain development in early life necessitates a synthesis of evidence across a broad spectrum of scientific discovery. Phenomenological and mechanistic studies conducted at the level of cellular and systems neuroscience must be integrated with proteomic investigations aimed at understanding the organization and function of the protein networks that instantiate the impact of experience. Recent progress in characterizing the contributions of early visual experience to the development of functional circuits in the visual cortex has laid the foundation for the identification of proteins that are expressed differentially in brain development and modulated by visual experience. Ongoing studies are now uniting the power of proteomics with novel neurophysiological approaches to probe the molecular, cellular, and circuit mechanisms by which experience interacts with endogenous programs of brain development.
