Inositol polyphosphate multikinase (IPMK), the key enzyme for the biosynthesis of higher inositol polyphosphates and phosphatidylinositol 3,4,5-trisphosphate, also acts as a versatile signaling player in regulating tissue growth and metabolism. To elucidate neurobehavioral functions of IPMK, we generated mice in which IPMK was deleted from the excitatory neurons of the postnatal forebrain. These mice showed no deficits in either novel object recognition or spatial memory. IPMK conditional knockout mice formed cued fear memory normally but displayed enhanced fear extinction. Signaling analyses revealed dysregulated expression of neural genes accompanied by selective activation of the mechanistic target of rapamycin (mTOR) regulatory enzyme p85 S6 kinase 1 (S6K1) in the amygdala following fear extinction. The IPMK mutants also manifested facilitated hippocampal long-term potentiation. These findings establish a signaling action of IPMK that mediates fear extinction.inositol polyphosphate multikinase | memory | fear extinction | long-term potentiation I nositol polyphosphate multikinase (IPMK) is a pleiotropic protein. As an enzyme, it catalyzes the production of watersoluble inositol polyphosphates (IPs), such as inositol 1,4,5,6tetrakisphosphate [Ins(1,4,5,6)P 4 ] (1, 2) and lipid-bound phosphatidylinositol 3,4,5-triphosphates (3, 4). The catalytic products of IPMK directly influence downstream target proteins. For example, deletion of IPMK in mouse embryonic fibroblasts reduced Akt kinase signaling by interrupting the PI-3 kinase activity of IPMK (4). In addition to its catalytic role in inositol phosphate metabolism, IPMK noncatalytically regulates major signaling factors, including mechanistic target of rapamycin (mTOR), p53, serum response factor, and tumor necrosis factor receptor-associated factor 6 (5-8). In mammalian cells, therefore, IPMK coordinates the activity of diverse signaling networks involved in gene expression, growth, metabolism, and innate immunity (9-11). In a previous study, our group reported that the conditional Ipmk knockout during the early embryonic stage of neurodevelopment by using Nestin-Cre transgenic mice blunted the response of immediate early genes to electroconvulsive stimuli and exhibited a spatial memory deficit under the Barnes maze test (12). However, nothing is known of IPMK's physiologic impact on neural functions in the context of specific neuronal cell types.Memory of fearful events forms quickly and is difficult to erase. In rodent models, fear can be created via Pavlovian conditioning paradigms, in which a biologically neutral stimulus (such as a tone) or context (conditioned stimulus, or CS) is paired with an aversive, unconditioned stimulus (US, such as a footshock). The memory of the CS-US association is robust and long-lasting, but if the CS is repeatedly presented in the absence of the US, the fear response is gradually reduced through a process known as extinction (13,14). Extinction of fear memory is learned by the formation of new memories that suppress conditi...