Neurochemical features of boar lumbosacral dorsal root ganglion neurons and characterization of sensory neurons innervating the urinary bladder trigone

Abstract

Porcine lumbosacral dorsal root ganglion (DRG) neurons were neurochemically characterized by using six neuronal markers: calcitonin gene‐related peptide (CGRP), substance P (SP), neuronal nitric oxide synthase (nNOS), neurofilament 200kDa (NF200), transient receptor potential vanilloid 1 (TRPV1), and isolectin B4 (IB4) from Griffonia simplicifolia. In addition, the phenotype and cross‐sectional area of DRG neurons innervating the urinary bladder trigone (UBT) were evaluated by coupling retrograde tracer technique and immunohistochemistry. Lumbar and sacral DRG neuronal subpopulations were immunoreactive (IR) for CGRP (30 ± 3% and 29 ± 3%, respectively), SP (26 ± 8% and 27 ± 12%, respectively), nNOS (21 ± 4% and 26 ± 7%, respectively), NF200 (75 ± 14% and 81 ± 7%, respectively), and TRPV1 (48 ± 13% and 43 ± 6%, respectively), and labeled for IB4 (56 ± 6% and 43 ± 10%, respectively). UBT sensory neurons, which were distributed from L2 to Ca1 DRG, had a segmental localization, showing their highest density in L4–L5 and S2–S4 DRG. Lumbar and sacral UBT sensory neurons expressed similar percentages of NF200 immunoreactivity (64 ± 33% and 58 ± 12%, respectively) but showed a significantly different immunoreactivity for CGRP, SP, nNOS, and TRPV1 (56 ± 9%, 39 ± 15%, 17 ± 13%, 62 ± 10% vs. 16 ± 6%, 16 ± 11%, 6 ± 1%, 45 ± 24%, respectively). Lumbar and sacral UBT sensory neurons also showed different IB4 labeling (67 ± 19% and 48 ± 16, respectively). Taken together, these data indicate that the lumbar and sacral pathways probably play different roles in sensory transmission from the UBT. The findings related to cell size also reinforced this hypothesis, because lumbar UBT sensory neurons were significantly larger than sacral ones (1,112 ± 624 μm2 vs. 716 ± 421 μm2). J. Comp. Neurol. 521:342–366, 2013. © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

CT-guided injection of a TRPV1 agonist around dorsal root ganglia decreases pain transmission in swine

“…4, A to C). To establish that another subset of sensory neurons remained intact, we examined expression of high–molecular weight neurofilament (NF200), a marker of a large proportion of myelinated neurons (30). The percentage of NF200-immunoreactive (IR) cell bodies was not significantly affected by RTX injection (RTX-treated DRG, 69.3 ± 3.9%, 567 of 818; vehicle-injected DRG, 71.6 ± 4.7%, 985 of 1375; P = 0.27), consistent with the receptor-based mechanism of action (Fig.…”

“…We also monitored calcitonin gene–related peptide (CGRP) immunoreactivity in the DRG and dorsal horn as CGRP defines a larger fraction of the nociceptors in DRG. Many DRG neurons coexpress TRPV1 (30). Consistent with this, the number of CGRP-IR cells decreased by 35.6% in treated DRG (27 ± 1.4%, 290 of 1055) compared to vehicle-only injection (42 ± 0.7%, 440 of 1044; P = 0.005) (Fig.…”

Effect of early embryonic deletion of huntingtin from pyramidal neurons on the development and long-term survival of neurons in cerebral cortex and striatum

“…Immunolabeling for DARPP32 was used to evaluate striatal projection neurons and their projections as a group. The anti-SP was a rabbit polyclonal antibody (ImmunoStar, AB1566) whose specificity has been documented previously (Russo et al, 2013; Zahm et al, 2013). The anti-D1 antibody was a rat monoclonal directed against the 97-amino acid C-terminal fragment of human D1 (Sigma-Aldrich, D187), whose specificity has been demonstrated previously (Levey et al, 1993; Hersch et al, 1995).…”

Neurochemical Features of the Autonomic Neurons Projecting to the Cremaster Muscle of the Boar

“…The specificity of the anti-CGRP (Sigma-Aldrich), antinNOS (Chemicon-Millipore), anti-TH (Sigma-Aldrich), anti-NPY (Sigma-Aldrich), and anti-VAChT (Sigma Aldrich) antibodies has been recently tested by Western blot (Wb) analysis on porcine tissues (Russo et al, 2013;Ragionieri et al, 2013). Furthermore, the Sigma-Aldrich or Amersham datasheets state the specificity of anti-SP, anti-VIP, anti rabbit IgG/FITC, anti mouse IgG/Biotin and Streptavidin/Texas Red antibodies for porcine tissues.…”

“…The experimental animal used was the pig, because it is an important model for biomedical, neuro-anatomical, and zootechnical studies (Dodds, 1982;Swindle et al, 1992;Kaleczyc et al, 2002;Russo et al, 2013).…”