title: FACS identifies unique cocaine-induced gene regulation in selectively activated adult striatal neurons.
abstract: Numerous studies with the neural activity marker Fos indicate that cocaine activates only a small proportion of sparsely distributed striatal neurons. Until now, efficient methods were not available to assess neuroadaptations induced specifically within these activated neurons. We used fluorescence-activated cell sorting (FACS) to purify striatal neurons activated during cocaine-induced locomotion in naive and cocaine-sensitized cfos-lacZ transgenic rats. Activated neurons were labeled with an antibody against β-galactosidase, the protein product of the lacZ gene. Cocaine induced a unique gene expression profile selectively in the small proportion of activated neurons that was not observed in the nonactivated majority of neurons. These genes included altered levels of the immediate early genes arc, fosB, and nr4a3, as well as genes involved in p38 MAPK signaling and cell-type specificity. We propose that this FACS method can be used to study molecular neuroadaptations in specific neurons encoding the behavioral effects of abused drugs and other learned behaviors.
authors.affiliation: Behavioral Neuroscience Branch, Intramural Research Program/National Institute on Drug Abuse/National Institutes of Health/Department of Health and Human Services, Baltimore, Maryland 21224, USA.
authors.forename: Danielle
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Guez-Barber
authors.forename: Sanya
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Fanous
authors.forename: Sam A
authors.initials: SA
authors.lastname: Golden
authors.forename: Regina
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Schrama
authors.forename: Eisuke
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Koya
authors.forename: Anna L
authors.initials: AL
authors.lastname: Stern
authors.forename: Jennifer M
authors.initials: JM
authors.lastname: Bossert
authors.forename: Brandon K
authors.initials: BK
authors.lastname: Harvey
authors.forename: Marina R
authors.initials: MR
authors.lastname: Picciotto
authors.forename: Bruce T
authors.initials: BT
authors.lastname: Hope
mesh_terms: D000704:Analysis of Variance; D000818:Animals; D003042:Cocaine / Q000494:pharmacology*; D003342:Corpus Striatum / Q000187:drug effects* / Q000378:metabolism; D005260:Female; D005434:Flow Cytometry; D015870:Gene Expression / Q000187:drug effects; D005786:Gene Expression Regulation / Q000187:drug effects*; D017781:Genes, Immediate-Early / Q000187:drug effects*; D007150:Immunohistochemistry; D009474:Neurons / Q000187:drug effects* / Q000378:metabolism; D051381:Rats; D017207:Rats, Sprague-Dawley; D055647:Rats, Transgenic; D020133:Reverse Transcriptase Polymerase Chain Reaction
chemical_list: D003042:Cocaine