Gene targeting approaches to analyse neurotransmitter receptor function

In the last two years, gene targeting approaches have been applied to generate mutant mouse strains bearing heritable alterations of neurotransmitter receptor genes. The analysis of mouse strains with planned mutations of receptor genes is proving to be a valuable approach to examine the contributions of particular receptor subtypes to neural development, physiology, behavior and drug actions. In the near future, a large number of receptor mutant strains will become available for the analysis of receptor function. This review will focus on recent studies of such strains, and the potential benefits and limitations of gene targeting approaches to receptor function will be discussed.