A microcomputer-based system for stereotaxic coordinates in the rat brain

doi:10.1016/0031-9384(86)90430-0

Physiology & Behavior

Volume 38, Issue 4, October 1986, Pages 593-596

https://doi.org/10.1016/0031-9384(86)90430-0 Get rights and content

Abstract

In this report, the computer hardware and software used in the generation of a stereotaxic rat brain atlas are described. The atlas consists of sagittal and frontal sections drawn to the high-resolution page of the Apple II series computer. Brain architectural and macroscopic areas are represented by lines. Microscopic areas are represented by dots. The system employs a large data base to make available hundreds of brain areas on stereotaxic sections containing precise positional information of thousands of specific locations. For each display, the brain area is identified by name and by cross-hairs with digital display of stereotaxic coordinates. These coordinates may be referenced by earbar-zero or bregma. Other program options allow the printing of brain sections and a listing of available brain areas. Although designed for research in the neurosciences, the software may also be used for educational purposes.

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LC-MS/MS combined with blood-brain dual channel microdialysis for simultaneous determination of active components of astragali radix-safflower combination and neurotransmitters in rats with cerebral ischemia reperfusion injury: Application in pharmacokinetic and pharmacodynamic study
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Citation Excerpt :
The skin and subcutaneous tissue near fontanelle were separated to expose bone surface. The point of hippocampus area was located according to the coordinates (AP: +4.8 mm, ml: +5 mm, DV: −3 mm) (Kroon and Riley, 1986). The dental drill was used to drill hole at bone surface.
Astragali Radix-Safflower combination (ARSC) is widely utilized in clinic to treat cerebral ischemia/reperfusion injury (CI/RI). Whereas, there is no in-depth research of the pharmacokinetics (PK) and pharmacodynamics (PD) analysis of ARSC after intragastric administration in rats with CI/RI.
The purpose of this research is to investigate the PK characteristics of eight active ingredients (astragaloside IV, calycosin, calycosin-7-O-β-glucoside, formononetin, ononin, hydroxysafflor yellow A, syringin and vernine) of ARSC, and the regulation of neurotransmitters disorders, revealing the pharmacodynamic substance basis and the mechanism of ARSC in treating CI/RI from the molecular level.
We established a new method which based on blood-brain dual channel microdialysis (MD) coupled with liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS) to continuously gather, and determine the components of ARSC and neurotransmitters related to CI/RI in vivo. The collected data were analyzed by sigmoid-E_max function. The neurotransmitters primarily regulated in CI/RI rat were discussed by principal component analysis and the compound most associated with total pharmacodynamics was chosen by partial least squares regression.
The validated LC-MS/MS method had specificity and selectivity to simultaneously analyze the concentration of eight active components of ARSC extract and five neurotransmitters of CI/RI rats. The recovery rates of brain MD probe and blood MD probe were stable within six hours. The MD probes recovery rates decreased with the increase of flow rates, but the solution concentration had little effect on the probes recovery rates. It was feasible to correct the recovery rates of probes in vivo by using reverse dialysis method. All eight active ingredients of ARSC could pass across the blood brain barrier after CI/RI. ARSC regulated the release of glutamate (Glu), γ-aminobutyric acid (GABA), dopamine (DA), 5-hydroxytryptamine (5-HT) and aspartic acid (Asp). Notably, astragaloside IV and hydroxysafflor yellow A might have better regulatory effect on neurotransmitters in comparison with other six measured components of ARSC, and Glu was the neurotransmitter mainly regulated in CI/RI rats.
The ARSC was able to treat CI/RI through ameliorating neurotransmitters disorders. There was a hysteresis between the peaked drug concentration and maximum therapeutic effect of ARSC. The drug effective concentrations range of ASIV, calycosin, calycosin-7-O-β-glucoside, syringin and vernine in blood microdialysate and calycosin, syringin, vernine in brain microdialysate were narrow, which need be paid attention in clinical use.
Therapeutic targeting of STING-TBK1-IRF3 signalling ameliorates chronic stress induced depression-like behaviours by modulating neuroinflammation and microglia phagocytosis
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Brain sections (containing the prefrontal cortex and the hippocampus) were collected for immunofluorescence assays. The prefrontal cortex and hippocampus were dissected according to the atlas of Paxinos and Watson (Kroon and Riley, 1986) and were prepared for quantitative real-time PCR and western blot analyses (n = 6–8 animals per test). The left half of the prefrontal cortex and hippocampus were used for real-time PCR assays.
Stress is well known to contribute to the development of both neurological and psychiatric diseases. In the central nervous system, a role for STING (stimulator of interferon genes) in modulating immunological responses has been widely suggested, and this protein possesses both neurotoxic and neuroprotective properties. However, the potential role of the STING signalling pathway and the underlying regulatory mechanism in chronic stress have not been well established. In this study, C57BL/6 mice were subjected to intermittent restraint stress for 14 days (6 h/day), and sucrose preference, elevated plus maze, and tail suspension tests were performed by mice subjected to chronic restraint stress (RST). Here, we showed that RST mice displayed depression-like behaviours, accompanied by increased levels of proinflammatory cytokines in the brain. We also observed remarkably decreased levels of the pathway components STING, p-TBK1 (phospho-TANK-binding kinase-1), and p-IRF3 (phospho-interferon regulatory factor-3) in the hippocampus and the prefrontal cortex of RST mice. Significant reductions in STING fluorescence intensity were also observed in the hippocampus and the prefrontal cortex of RST mice. Next, fluorescently labelled latex beads, flow cytometry, and CD68-positive cell counts were utilized to evaluate the phagocytic abilities of microglia in vivo and in vitro. Importantly, our results first indicated that activation of the STING pathway by administration of the STING agonist 2′3-cGAMP enhanced microglial phagocytosis and suppressed the release of the proinflammatory cytokines TNF-α, IL-6, and IL-1β in the brains of RST mice, which further led to antidepressant effects. Based on the results of our study, the amelioration of stress-driven depression-like behaviours by activation of the STING pathway is associated with the suppression of neuroinflammation and enhanced phagocytosis.
A multifunctional compound ebselen reverses memory impairment, apoptosis and oxidative stress in a mouse model of sporadic Alzheimer's disease
2019, Journal of Psychiatric Research
Citation Excerpt :
The stereotaxic coordinates for the lateral ventricle were measured accurately as anterio-posterior −0.8 mm, lateral 1.5 mm and dorso-ventral, −4.0 mm relative to bregma and ventral from dura with the tooth bar set at 0 mm. Through a skull hole, a 28-gauge Hamilton® syringe of 10 μl attached to a stereotaxic apparatus and piston of the syringe was lowered manually into lateral ventricle (Kroon and Riley, 1986). STZ (3 mg/kg, icv, 1 μl/min) was dissolved in citrate buffer (3 mg/ml, pH 4.4) (Tiwari et al., 2009) just prior to administration.
Alzheimer 's disease (AD) is characterized by progressive cognitive decline including memory impairment, cortical dysfunction, and neuropsychiatric disturbances. The drug discovery to treat AD consists to develop compounds able to act in multiple molecular targets involved in the pathogenesis of the disease and the repositioning of old drugs for new application. This way, the intracerebroventricular (icv) injection of streptozotocin (STZ) has been used as a metabolic model of sporadic AD. The aim of the present study was to investigate whether ebselen (1–10 mg/kg), a multifunctional selenoorganic compound, ameliorates memory impairment, hippocampal oxidative stress, apoptosis and cell proliferation in a mouse model of sporadic AD induced by icv STZ (3 mg/kg, 1 μl/min). The administration of ebselen (10 mg/kg, i.p.) reversed memory impairment and hippocampal oxidative stress, by increasing the activities of antioxidant enzymes and the level of a non-enzymatic antioxidant defense, in Swiss mice administered with icv STZ. The anti-apoptotic property of ebselen was demonstrated by its effectiveness against the increase in the ratios of Bax/Bcl-2, cleaved PARP/PARP and the cleaved caspase-3 levels in the hippocampus of icv STZ mice. Although ebselen reversed memory impairment, it was ineffective against the reduction in the number of BrdU positive cells induced by icv STZ. In conclusion, the multifunctional selenoorganic compound ebselen was effective to reverse memory impairment, hippocampal oxidative stress and apoptosis in a mouse model of sporadic AD induced by icv STZ.
Effects of Noggin-Transfected Neural Stem Cells on Neural Functional Recovery and Underlying Mechanism in Rats with Cerebral Ischemia Reperfusion Injury
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Citation Excerpt :
Then, brain edema was calculated as follows: brain water content (%) = [(wet weight − dry weight)/wet weight] × 100. Following behavioral testing, the rats (n = 10 for each group) were decapitated, and brains were quickly removed, the dentate gyrus from the ischemic hemisphere was dissected according to the rat brain in stereotaxic coordinates.21,22 Some brain tissues were flash frozen with liquid nitrogen and were stored at −80°C until analyzed, the others were rinsed in cold physiological saline to remove blood, and 10% (w/v) homogenate was prepared using a tissue homogenizer (10 seconds per time, with an interval of 20 seconds for 3 times).
To investigate neuroprotection of noggin-transfected neural stem cells (NSCs) against focal cerebral ischemia reperfusion injury (IRI) in rats.
Eighty Wistar rats were randomly divided into the sham, IRI, NSCs, and noggin + NSCs groups. Noggin containing adenoviral vectors was transfected into rat NSCs. Rats were subjected to 2.0 hours middle cerebral artery occlusion and reperfusion 1.0 hour, followed by infusion into the lateral ventricles of NSCs alone, noggin-transfected NSCs, and saline at 3 days in the NSCs, noggin + NSCs, and sham groups, respectively. All rats were sacrificed on 1, 3, 7, and 28 days after transplantation; the colorimetric method was used to detect the levels of superoxide dismutase (SOD) and the malondialdehyde (MDA) content after the behavior capability determined. Western blot was performed for detecting the expression of vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) and basic fibroblast growth factor (bFGF) proteins. The TUNEL-positive and BrdU/nestin double-positive cells were observed under a light microscope and quantitative analysis was performed by morphometric technique.
Noggin-transfected NSCs significantly decreased the infarct volume and improved the neurological scores. Noggin-transfected NSCs also reduced the percentage of apoptotic neurons and relieved neuronal morphological damage. Noggin-transfected NSC transplantation markedly decreased the MDA levels and increased the SOD activity, and simultaneously downregulated the BMP4 (bone morphogenesis protein), VEGF, and bFGF proteins.
The present study demonstrates that grafting NSCs modified by noggin gene provides better neuroprotection for cerebrovascular disease.
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When establishing an imaging system to support a microscopy laboratory, it is important to seek information from individuals who have knowledge of video, audio and computer equipment. The type of camera system purchased may depend upon the type of microscopy performed in the laboratory. Fluorescence microscopy will require a camera that is capable of operating at very low light levels. A digital camera will provide higher resolution than a video camera capable of only 470 or 750 lines of horizontal resolution. The operating platform (e.g., DOS, Windows, OS/2, Macintosh, UNIX, VAX/VMS) chosen for the imaging system may depend on the platform already existing in the laboratory or upon the programming expertise available. With any of these systems, purchase as much central processing unit (CPU) power and memory as is affordable, especially if 3-dimensional modeling is being planned. Once images have been obtained, they can be printed or shared with other researchers using network tools such as Mosaic.
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A microcomputer-based system for stereotaxic coordinates in the rat brain

Abstract

Comput Programs Biomed

The application of a computer controlled microscope to autoradiographs of nerve tissue

A computer system for the measurement of cell and nuclear sizes

J Microsc

On-line computerized analysis of peripheral nerves