• Home
  1. Home
  2. Long-term, high-resolution imaging in the mouse neocortex through a chronic cranial window
Scientific article
English

Long-term, high-resolution imaging in the mouse neocortex through a chronic cranial window

Contributors

Holtmaat, Anthony; Bonhoeffer, Tobias; Chow, David K.; Chuckowree, Jyoti; De Paola, Vincenzo; Hofer, Sonja B.; Hübener, Mark; Keck, Tara; Knott, Graham; Lee, Wei-Chung A.; Mostany, Ricardo; Mrsic-Flogel, Tom D.; Nedivi, Elly; Portera-Cailliau, Carlos; Svoboda, Karel; Trachtenberg, Joshua T.; Wilbrecht, Linda

Published in

Nature protocols, vol. 4, no. 8, p. 1128-1144

Publication date

2009

Abstract

To understand the cellular and circuit mechanisms of experience-dependent plasticity, neurons and their synapses need to be studied in the intact brain over extended periods of time. Two-photon excitation laser scanning microscopy (2PLSM), together with expression of fluorescent proteins, enables high-resolution imaging of neuronal structure in vivo. In this protocol we describe a chronic cranial window to obtain optical access to the mouse cerebral cortex for long-term imaging. A small bone flap is replaced with a coverglass, which is permanently sealed in place with dental acrylic, providing a clear imaging window with a large field of view (approximately 0.8-12 mm(2)). The surgical procedure can be completed within approximately 1 h. The preparation allows imaging over time periods of months with arbitrary imaging intervals. The large size of the imaging window facilitates imaging of ongoing structural plasticity of small neuronal structures in mice, with low densities of labeled neurons. The entire dendritic and axonal arbor of individual neurons can be reconstructed.

Keywords

  • Animals
  • Craniotomy/methods
  • Luminescent Proteins/analysis
  • Mice
  • Microscopy, Fluorescence
  • Neocortex/cytology/physiology
  • Neuronal Plasticity
  • Neurons/cytology/metabolism
  • Skull/surgery

UNIGE affiliation entities

UNIGE research groups

Citation (ISO format)

HOLTMAAT, Anthony et al. Long-term, high-resolution imaging in the mouse neocortex through a chronic cranial window. In: Nature protocols, 2009, vol. 4, n° 8, p. 1128–1144. doi: 10.1038/nprot.2009.89

Main files (1)

Article (Published version)

Identifiers

Additional URL for this publication

http://www.nature.com/nprot/journal/v4/n8/full/nprot.2009.89.html

Journal ISSN

1750-2799
779views
0downloads

Technical informations

Creation

04/03/2010 08:48:00

First validation

04/03/2010 08:48:00

Update

14/03/2023 15:24:38

Status update

14/03/2023 15:24:38

Last indexation

29/10/2024 13:03:35
All rights reserved by Archive ouverte UNIGE and the University of Geneva
OpenAIRE Indexed & Validated