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The Journal of Neuroscience, January 1, 2002, 22(1):183-192
Protoplasmic Astrocytes in CA1 Stratum Radiatum Occupy Separate
Anatomical Domains
Eric A.
Bushong1, 3,
Maryann E.
Martone1, 2,
Ying
Z.
Jones1, 2, and
Mark H.
Ellisman1, 2
1 National Center for Microscopy and Imaging Research,
2 Department of Neurosciences, and 3 Biomedical
Sciences Graduate Program, University of California, San Diego, La
Jolla, California 92093-0608
Protoplasmic astrocytes are increasingly thought to interact
extensively with neuronal elements in the brain and to influence their
activity. Recent reports have also begun to suggest that physiologically, and perhaps functionally, diverse forms of these cells
may be present in the CNS. Our current understanding of astrocyte form and distribution is based predominately on studies that
used the astrocytic marker glial fibrillary acidic protein (GFAP) and
on studies using metal-impregnation techniques. The prevalent opinion,
based on studies using these methods, is that astrocytic processes
overlap extensively and primarily share the underlying neuropil.
However, both of these techniques have serious shortcomings for
visualizing the interactions among these structurally complex cells. In
the present study, intracellular injection combined with
immunohistochemistry for GFAP show that GFAP delineates only ~15% of
the total volume of the astrocyte. As a result, GFAP-based images have
led to incorrect conclusions regarding the interaction of processes of
neighboring astrocytes. To investigate these interactions in detail,
groups of adjacent protoplasmic astrocytes in the CA1 stratum radiatum
were injected with fluorescent intracellular tracers of distinctive
emissive wavelengths and analyzed using three-dimensional (3D) confocal
analysis and electron microscopy. Our findings show that protoplasmic
astrocytes establish primarily exclusive territories. The knowledge of
how the complex morphology of protoplasmic astrocytes affects their 3D
relationships with other astrocytes, oligodendroglia, neurons, and
vasculature of the brain should have important implications for our
understanding of nervous system function.
Key words:
glia; contact spacing; hippocampus; dye injection; Lucifer yellow; GFAP
Copyright © 2002 Society for Neuroscience 0270-6474/02/221183-10$05.00/0
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