Contact Points
Wood Dale, Illinois
United States
We will use this for stereotaxic injection into the substantia nigra of mouse brains, which is a very small region and therefore requires these features exclusive to this system:
- Calibration and automatic calculation across different animals relative to the bregma and lambda for accurate tissue targeting and reproducibility (eliminates calculation errors).
- Controlled and steady flow rate of injection to maximize survival and absorption
- Coordination of drilling and injection which increases accuracy of tissue targeting and minimizes drill hole size (beneficial for survival and healing)
In the central nervous system, oligodendrocytes are cells responsible for producing myelin, the insulation around electrically active axons of neurons. Myelin facilitates fast electrical conductance in an analogous way as rubber insulation around electrical wiring. Proper development and maintenance of oligodendrocytes has important implications on demyelinating disease, including multiple sclerosis, a disease in which immune cells attack and destroy myelin, and leukodystrophies, childhood diseases in which myelin fails to form properly leading to progressive disability. In addition, recent studies also support a role for oligodendrocytes in psychiatric disease and in memory, including in Alzheimer’s disease.
Our lab focuses on understanding the cell biology and building blocks of the oligodendrocyte, and how they contribute to normal brain function and disease. The oligodendrocyte is a cell that is shaped like a tree, with many branches that terminate to form myelin sheaths, which wrap concentrically around the axon in many layers, much like a long paper towel roll or a bolt of fabric. Our questions primarily underly the structure of these branches – microtubules that form the roads of these cells – and the cargos that travel along them, including organelles and mRNA genetic messages.
One key finding of our lab is that normal proteins that function to build microtubules in oligodendrocytes may aberrantly aggregate in neurological diseases, such as multiple system atrophy (MSA) and Alzheimer’s disease (AD). In order to model these diseases in rodents without using transgenic models (i.e., for diseases without a known genetic cause), we need a reproducible and accurate way to inject disease-causing materials into mouse brains.
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