Premium
Visualization of oligodendrocytes and astrocytes in the intact rat optic nerve by intracellular injection of lucifer yellow and horseradish peroxidase
Author(s) -
Butt Arthur M.,
Ransom Bruce R.
Publication year - 1989
Publication title -
glia
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.954
H-Index - 164
eISSN - 1098-1136
pISSN - 0894-1491
DOI - 10.1002/glia.440020609
Subject(s) - lucifer yellow , horseradish peroxidase , biology , anatomy , optic nerve , neuroscience , intracellular , microbiology and biotechnology , biochemistry , gap junction , enzyme
The morphology of glial cells in the intact rat optic nerve, a central nervous system (CNS) white matter tract, was analysed by filling over 500 macroglial cells intracellularly with horseradish peroxidase (HRP) or Lucifer yellow (LY). Two main cell types were distinguished: fibrous astrocytes and cells presumed to be oligodendrocytes. Intracellularly stained astrocytes were highly complex, with 50–60 long branching processes which passed radially from the cell body and terminated in end‐feet at the pial surface or on blood vessels; some processes ended freely in the nerve parenchyma. Astrocytes filled with LY were usually dye‐coupled to other astrocytes after the first week of life. Filled oligodendrocytes had a unique appearance that unmistakably distinguished them from astrocytes and were occasionally dye‐coupled to nearby oligodendrocytes. These cells had 20–30 longitudinally oriented processes 150–200 μm long, which passed exclusively along the long axis of the nerve parallel to axons; the longitudinal processes were connected to the cell body by thin branches 15–30 μm long. The longitudinal processes probably represent the tongue processes of the internodal myelin sheaths, and thus each oligodendrocyte appears to myelinate 20–30 axons with sheaths that are 150–200 μm in length.