Standardizing optic nerve crushes with an aneurysm clip.
OBJECTIVE
Despite the widespread use of optic nerve injury models to simulate central nervous system injury, model protocols vary from laboratory to laboratory, making it difficult to directly compare findings between studies.


METHODS
To standardize the optic nerve crush injury model, the commercially available Yasargil aneurysm clip, which provides a consistent clamping force, was used to produce a crush injury to the rat optic nerve. Histology was verified with hematoxylin-eosin. The number of retinal ganglion cells (RGCs) was counted by fluorescent gold dye labeling.


RESULTS
Following nerve crush injury, the density of RGCs was substantially reduced in the aneurysm clip-operated group relative to the normal and sham-operated groups, and no discernable difference was noted between the latter two control groups.


CONCLUSIONS
The present findings suggest that Yasargil aneurysm clip effectively produces permanent injury to the optic nerve with evidence from retrograde tracing of RGCs and may provide a standard technique for optic nerve crush studies.
Feng
Dong-Fu
DF
Department of Neurosurgery, No. 3 People's Hospital, Shanghai Jiao Tong University School of Medicine, Shanghai, China. dffeng@21cn.com
Chen
Er-Tao
ET
Li
Xue-Yuan
XY
Liu
Yong
Y
Wang
Yang
Y
D000818:Animals; D002452:Cell Count; D002490:Central Nervous System / Q000293:injuries; D004195:Disease Models, Animal; D005456:Fluorescent Dyes; D009409:Nerve Crush / Q000295:instrumentation* / Q000379:methods / Q000592:standards*; D056325:Neuronal Tract-Tracers; D009900:Optic Nerve / Q000473:pathology / Q000601:surgery; D020221:Optic Nerve Injuries / Q000209:etiology* / Q000473:pathology; D010784:Photomicrography; D011897:Random Allocation; D051381:Rats; D017207:Rats, Sprague-Dawley; D012160:Retina / Q000473:pathology; D012165:Retinal Ganglion Cells / Q000473:pathology; D013525:Surgical Instruments
D005456:Fluorescent Dyes; D056325:Neuronal Tract-Tracers