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Quantitative chemical composition of cortical GABAergic neurons revealed in transgenic venus-expressing rats.

Cerebral cortex (New York, N.Y. : 1991) (2007-05-23)
Masakazu Uematsu, Yasuharu Hirai, Fuyuki Karube, Satoe Ebihara, Megumi Kato, Kuniya Abe, Kunihiko Obata, Sachiko Yoshida, Masumi Hirabayashi, Yuchio Yanagawa, Yasuo Kawaguchi
RÉSUMÉ

Although neocortical GABAergic (gamma-aminobutyric acidergic) interneurons have been the focus of intense study, especially in the rat, a consensus view of the functional diversity and organization of inhibitory cortical neurons has not yet been achieved. To better analyze GABAergic neurons in the rat, we used a bacterial artificial chromosome (BAC) construct and established 2 lines of transgenic rats that coexpress Venus, a yellow fluorescent protein, with the vesicular GABA transporter. The brain GABA content from both transgenic lines was similar to the level found in wild-type rats. In the frontal cortex, Venus was expressed in >95% of GABAergic neurons, most of which also expressed at least one of 6 biochemical markers, including alpha-actitin-2, which preferentially labeled late-spiking neurogliaform cells. Taking advantage of the fact that Venus expression allows for targeted recording from all classes of nonpyramidal cells, irrespective of their somatic morphologies, we demonstrated that fast-spiking neurons, which were heterogeneous in somatic size as well as vertical dendritic projection, had relatively uniform horizontal dimensions, suggesting a cell type-specific columnar input territory. Our data demonstrate the benefits of VGAT-Venus rats for investigating GABAergic circuits, as well as the feasibility of using BAC technology in rats to label subsets of specific, genetically defined neurons.

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Anti-GABA Antibody, clone 5A9, clone 5A9, Chemicon®, from mouse