Expression of Phenotypic Astrocyte Marker Is Increased in a Transgenic Mouse Model of Alzheimer’s Disease versus Age-Matched Controls: A Presymptomatic Stage Study

Figure 3

TSPO expression in the hippocampus of 3-month-old WT and APPswe/PS1dE9 mice. (a) Representative immunoblot of TSPO (15 kDa) in the hippocampus of WT ( = 5) and APPswe/PS1dE9 ( = 6) mice. Equal protein loading was confirmed by detection of β-actin (42 kDa) and results were expressed as relative optical density (ROD). (b) In APPswe/PS1dE9 mice, the correlations between TSPO and GFAP ( = 0.3762; ) and between TSPO and (c) TNFα ( = 0.3608; = 0.4822) were not significant. Linear regression analysis (b and c) was performed using the ROD values shown in Figures 3(a), 2(a), and 1(b) for TSPO, GFAP, and TNFα, respectively. (d) Representative autoradiographic images obtained on 16 µm thick sagittal brain sections: total (left panel) and nonspecific (right panel) binding in WT (upper) and T APPswe/PS1dE9 (lower) mice. (e) Quantitative autoradiographic measurements of TSPO density in the hippocampus were expressed as specific binding of [³H]PK-11195 in both groups. Data represent mean of cpm/mm² for each WT () and APPswe/PS1dE9 () mouse. NTg: wild type; Tg: APPswe/PS1dE9.

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