Name: triggering reactive gliosis in vivo by a forebrain stab injury
Uploaded: 2015-06-29T13:00:00
Description: Watch this Scientific Journal Video about Triggering Reactive Gliosis In Vivo by a Forebrain Stab Injury at JoVE.com

We thank Katherine Clark for technical assistance. A.D.R.G. is funded in part by 5K01MH097957-03

Adult (3-4 months old) male mice on a mixed C57BL/6 background were used in this protocol. Animals were kept on a 12 hr light/dark cycle, and allowed free access to food and water. All procedures performed in this protocol were conducted according to protocols approved by the Drexel University Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee.
1. Preparing Surgical Area
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	<li>Disinfect surgical table with 70% ethanol, then cover the entire surgical bench with absorbent pads and arrange surgica...

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It is critical that the skull or underlying dura are not damaged during the drilling. Use light pressure while drilling to ensure the skull is not punctured. In addition, care should be taken while lifting the skull piece to ensure the dura is not lifted off with the bone.
The forebrain stab injury described here models a penetrating injury to the CNS. Though less clinically translatable than TBI models such as FPI or CCI, the forebrain stab lesion model serves as a useful tool for a broad ran...

A major challenge for developing successful therapies to treat the injured CNS is an incomplete understanding of the complex multicellular events that are triggered by the trauma. Reactive astrocytes are gaining increasing recognition as a promising target for novel therapies1. Though historically regarded as hostile to neural repair, reactive astrocytes are now recognized as critical components of a complex, multicellular neuroprotective response that includes attenuation of inflammatory processes and limiting secondary damage and neurodegeneration2-6. Although the neuropathological characteristics of reactive gliosis have long been well defined, the cellular and molecular mechanisms regulating reactive gliosis, and the diverse array of downstream consequences remain poorly understood. Understanding the mechanisms that drive reactive gliosis, as well as the subsequent cellular and molecular events, is an important step towards developing strategies aimed at promoting the neuroprotective properties of reactive gliosis, while attenuating the detrimental effects. 
Here we demonstrate a method to induce severe reactive astrogliosis in the forebrain of adult mice using a stab injury. In contrast to other traumatic brain injury (TBI) models, such as controlled cortical impact (CCI) or fluid percussion injury (FPI), which require specialized equipment to produce an injury, the forebrain stab requires only a stereotaxic device to stabilize the head and a No. 11 scalpel blade. Thus the forebrain stab lesion model is more broadly accessible to a wide range of laboratories that do not have access to the specialized devices necessary for creating an FPI or CCI injury. The method described here enables investigators to reliably and reproducibly trigger a robust gliosis response to investigate subsequent cellular and molecular events. Once recovered from surgery, animals that have received a forebrain stab injury can survive for prolonged periods without the need for specialized care and can be returned to the colony for acute, intermediate, or chronic studies. Though less clinically translatable than FPI or CCI models of TBI, a forebrain lesion produced by a stab injury serves as a simple yet useful experimental model to investigate basic biological mechanisms underlying reactive gliosis and other neuropathological events following trauma to the CNS.

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			<td>stainless steel scalpel blade, #11</td>
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triggering reactive gliosis in vivo by a forebrain stab injury

Following injury to the CNS, astrocytes undergo a broad range of biochemical, morphological, and molecular changes collectively referred to as reactive astrogliosis. Reactive astrocytes exert both inflammatory and protective effects that inhibit and promote, respectively, neural repair. The mechanisms underlying the diverse functional properties of reactive astrogliosis are not well understood. Achieving a greater understanding of these mechanisms is critical to developing therapeutic strategies to treat the injured CNS. Here we demonstrate a method to trigger reactive astrogliosis in the adult mouse forebrain using a forebrain stab lesion. This lesion model is simple, reliable, and requires only a stereotaxic device and a scalpel blade to produce the injury. The use of stab lesions as an injury model in the forebrain is well established and amenable to studies addressing a broad range of neuropathological outcomes, such as neuronal degeneration, neuroinflammation, and disruptions in the blood brain barrier (BBB). Thus, the forebrain stab injury model serves as a powerful tool that can be applied for a broad range of studies on the CNS response to trauma.

Because animals undergoing this procedure do not require specialized post-operative care, short or long-term time survival periods are easily incorporated into the study, depending on the need to investigate acute or chronic pathology following injury. Principal features of reactive gliosis, such as upregulation of GFAP and hypertrophy of soma, can be observed as early as 2-3 days following injury. The peak phase of proliferation for reactive astrocytes is during days 3-5 following injury10. The representative...

Watch this Scientific Journal Video about Triggering Reactive Gliosis In Vivo by a Forebrain Stab Injury at JoVE.com

Triggering Reactive Gliosis In Vivo by a Forebrain Stab Injury

This article describes a detailed protocol to produce a forebrain stab injury in adult mice. The stab injury induces severe reactive gliosis and glial scar formation which can be subsequently examined by standard immunohistochemistry methods.

Triggering Reactive Gliosis In Vivo by a Forebrain Stab Injury

Following injury to the CNS, astrocytes undergo a broad range of biochemical, morphological, and molecular changes collectively referred to as reactive ...

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