dc.contributor.author | Rodriguez, Erica | |
dc.date.accessioned | 2020-09-18T19:37:19Z | |
dc.date.available | 2020-09-18T19:37:19Z | |
dc.date.issued | 2020 | |
dc.identifier.uri | https://hdl.handle.net/11274/12495 | |
dc.description | Creative Arts and Research Symposium | en_US |
dc.description.abstract | Understanding anatomical circuitries promotes the development of novel therapeutics to manage neurological pathologies. Tract
tracing is a neuroanatomical approach that allows visualization of neural pathways. Wheat germ agglutinin (WGA) is a transsynaptic
tracer taken up by neurons and passed to other networked neurons. WGA can be conjugated to a fluorescent dye
(WGA-488) to be observed with a microscope. The goal of our study was to develop methodology using WGA-488 to visualize
connectivity of the sensory nerves of the face into brainstem nuclei. We injected various volumes of 1% WGA-488 into the rat
cheek or the jaw joint. Post-mortem sensory ganglia and brainstem were collected 3- or 7-days later, sectioned, and analyzed
with a microscope. We found that 50 μL WGA-488 was observed in the trigeminal ganglia and several brainstem nuclei at 3-days
post-tracer injection. This methodology can now be used to characterize the functional neurochemistry of the orofacial sensory
neurons. | |
dc.description.sponsorship | Dayna Averitt | en_US |
dc.language.iso | en_US | en_US |
dc.title | Neuronal Tract Tracing in the Rat Trigeminal Sensory System | en_US |
dc.type | Presentation | en_US |