University of Düsseldorf

2 ARTICLES PUBLISHED IN JoVE

Biology

Generation, Purification, and Characterization of Cell-invasive DISC1 Protein Species

Verian Bader¹, Philipp Ottis¹, Martin Pum², Joseph P. Huston², Carsten Korth¹

¹Department of Neuropathology, Medical School Düsseldorf, Germany, ²Center of Behavioral Neuroscience, University of Düsseldorf

The generation, purification and cell invasion of intracellular, cytoplasmic full length DISC1 protein aggresomes from cell cultures and of a labeled, multimeric recombinant DISC1 protein fragment in E. coli are described. Cell invasiveness is shown for recipient cells in cell culture and for neurons in vivo after stereotactical brain inoculation.

Neuroscience

Generation of Topically Transgenic Rats by In utero Electroporation and In vivo Bioluminescence Screening

Sandra Vomund¹, Tamar Sapir², Orly Reiner², Maria A. de Souza Silva³, Carsten Korth¹

¹Department of Neuropathology, Medical School Düsseldorf, ²Department of Molecular Genetics, Weizmann Institute for Science, ³Center of Behavioral Neuroscience, University of Düsseldorf

Genes can be manipulated during development of the cortex or the hippocampus of the rat via in utero electroporation (IUE) at E16, to enable fast and targeted modifications in neuronal connectivity for later studies of behavior or neuropathology in adult animals. Postnatal in vivo imaging for control of IUE success is performed by bioluminescence of activating co-transfected luciferase.