title: Enrichment of unipolar brush cell-like neurons in primary rat cerebellar cultures.
abstract: Unipolar brush cells are a distinct class of excitatory interneurons situated in the granular layer of the cerebellar cortex, where they form giant synapses with individual mossy fiber terminals. We have previously shown that primary cerebellar cell cultures from embryonic and postnatal rodents contain neurons displaying morphological and chemical phenotypes characteristic of unipolar brush cells in situ, including intense staining with calretinin antiserum. In cultures from both embryonic and postnatal rats, the large majority of calretinin-positive neurons are unipolar brush cells, while granule cells are usually calretinin-negative. A small percentage of putative Golgi/Lugaro cells also express calretinin. We demonstrate here that the developmental stage of the source tissue, the concentration of potassium in the medium, and treatment with glutamate after differentiation have substantial effects on the density of putative unipolar brush cells in the cultures. In dissociated cultures obtained from embryos at gestation day E18 and E20 and from pups at postnatal day P0, P2, P5, P8, and P10 grown in 25 mM KCl, the percentage calretinin-positive cells progressively decreases from 24% to 0.1% of total cells. In cultures from E20 embryos grown in physiological potassium (5 mM KCl), calretinin-positive cells are enriched to approximately 60% of total cells, while the majority of calretinin-negative cells die. In embryonic cultures exposed to high concentrations of glutamate after 12 days in vitro, calretinin-positive neurons have a survival advantage over calretinin-negative cells and represent up to 83% of total cells.
authors.affiliation: Institute for Neuroscience, Northwestern University, Chicago, Illinois 60611, USA.
authors.forename: R
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Anelli
authors.forename: E
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Mugnaini
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D064032:Calbindin 2; D002452:Cell Count; D002478:Cells, Cultured; D002531:Cerebellum / Q000166:cytology* / Q000196:embryology / Q000254:growth & development; D005865:Gestational Age; D018698:Glutamic Acid / Q000494:pharmacology; D007395:Interneurons / Q000737:chemistry / Q000166:cytology* / Q000187:drug effects; D010641:Phenotype; D011189:Potassium Chloride / Q000008:administration & dosage / Q000494:pharmacology; D051381:Rats; D017207:Rats, Sprague-Dawley; D064030:S100 Calcium Binding Protein G / Q000032:analysis
chemical_list: C576512:Calb2 protein, rat; D064032:Calbindin 2; D064030:S100 Calcium Binding Protein G; D018698:Glutamic Acid; D011189:Potassium Chloride