Unipolar brush cell

Unipolar brush cell
Basic structure of the unipolar brush cell.
Details
Location	Cerebellum
Morphology	Round body with single short dendrite "brush"
Function	Excitatory interneuron
Neurotransmitter	Glutamate
Presynaptic connections	Vestibular ganglia and nuclei
Postsynaptic connections	Granular layer
Identifiers
NeuroLex ID	Cerebellum unipolar brush cell
Anatomical terminology []

Unipolar brush cells (UBCs) are a class of excitatory glutamatergic interneuron found in the granular layer of the cerebellar cortex and also in the granule cell domain of the cochlear nucleus.

The UBC has a round or oval cell body with usually a single short dendrite that ends in a brush-like tuft of short dendrioles (dendrites unique to UBCs). These brush dendrioles form very large synaptic junctions. The dendritic brush and the large endings of the axonal branches are involved in the formation of cerebellar glomeruli. The UBC has one short dendrite where the granule cell has four or five.

The brush dendrioles emit numerous, thin evaginations called filopodia, unique to UBCs. The filopodia emanate from all over the neuron, even including the dendritic stem and the cell body in some cells. Although UBC filopodia do not bear synaptic junctions, they are nevertheless involved in cell signaling.

UBCs are intrinsically firing neurons and considered as a class of excitatory “local circuit neurons”. They work together with vestibular fibres to integrate signals involving the orientation of the head that modulates reflex behaviour. UBCs function to amplify inputs from the vestibular ganglia and nuclei by spreading and prolonging excitation within the granular layer. They receive glutamatergic inputs on its dendritic brush from a single mossy fibre terminal in the form of a giant glutamatergic synapse and make glutamatergic synapses with granule cells and other UBCs.

UBCs are plentiful in those regions linked to vestibular functions. In mammals, UBCs show an uneven distribution within the granule cell domains of the hindbrain, being the most dense in the vermis, part of the flocculus/paraflocculus complex, and layers 2–4 of the dorsal cochlear nucleus. In the rat cerebellum, UBCs outnumber Golgi cells by a factor of 3 and approximately equal the number of Purkinje cells. Like other glutamatergic cells of the cerebellum, UBCs originate in the rhombic lip.