Targeted Microinjection and Electroporation of Primate Cerebral Organoids for Genetic Modification

The cerebral cortex is the outermost brain structure and is responsible for the processing of sensory input and motor output; it is seen as the seat of higher-order cognitive abilities in mammals, in particular, primates. Studying gene functions in primate brains is challenging due to technical and ethical reasons, but the establishment of the brain organoid technology has enabled the study of brain development in traditional primate models (e.g., rhesus macaque and common marmoset), as well as in previously experimentally inaccessible primate species (e.g., great apes), in an ethically justifiable and less technically demanding system. Moreover, human brain organoids allow the advanced investigation of neurodevelopmental and neurological disorders.

As brain organoids recapitulate many processes of brain development, they also represent a powerful tool to identify differences in, and to functionally compare, the genetic determinants underlying the brain development of various species in an evolutionary context. A great advantage of using organoids is the possibility to introduce genetic modifications, which permits the testing of gene functions. However, the introduction of such modifications is laborious and expensive. This paper describes a fast and cost-efficient approach to genetically modify cell populations within the ventricle-like structures of primate cerebral organoids, a subtype of brain organoids. This method combines a modified protocol for the reliable generation of cerebral organoids from human-, chimpanzee-, rhesus macaque-, and common marmoset-derived induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) with a microinjection and electroporation approach. This provides an effective tool for the study of neurodevelopmental and evolutionary processes that can also be applied for disease modeling.