Learning Mechanisms: The Case for CaM-KII

Long-term potentiation (LTP) is a strengthening of synapses in the brain that is thought to underlie learning and memory. Now in this issue Barria et al. show that the persistent change is likely to be phosphorylation of the postsynaptic glutamate receptor known as the AMPA receptor. Lisman et al. in their Perspective discuss how this phosphorylation may function to cause LTP and how these results fit in with other findings in the literature.