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Fig. 9 | BMC Biology

Fig. 9

From: Synaptic coupling of inner ear sensory cells is controlled by brevican-based extracellular matrix baskets resembling perineuronal nets

Fig. 9

Spatial coupling of presynaptic Cav1.3 and postsynaptic PSD-95 clusters at the IHC synapse in bcan−/− mice. a Immunohistochemical double-labeling of presynaptic Cav1.3 channels (red) and postsynaptic densities (PSD-95, green) in cochlear whole-mount preparations of bcan+/+ and bcan−/− mice, with one representative IHC indicated by the dashed line. The magnification of the basal part of the labeled IHC is illustrated in the inset in the merge figure. b Quantification of the number of postsynaptic densities labeled with anti-PSD-95 did not yield any genotype-specific difference (bcan+/+ (black): 115 [101,148] per 8 IHCs, n = 47 stretches of 8 IHCs of 8 whole-mounts, bcan−/− (red): 122 [112,130] per 8 IHCs, n = 23 stretches of 8 IHCs of 4 whole-mounts, p = 0.409, Mann-Whitney rank sum test). c The analysis of the spatial coupling between Cav1.3 channel clusters (red immunosignal) and PSD-95-positive postsynaptic densities (green immunosignal) revealed a significant reduction in co-localized red and green immunopositive punctae (group 1, p < 0.001, t test) and a significant increase in spatially shifted green and red immunopositive punctae (group 2, p < 0.001, t test) in bcan−/− mice. The immunopositive spots were quantified in maximum intensity projections of confocal stacks of stretches of 8 IHCs (bcan+/+: n = 47; bcan−/−: n = 23) imaged from 8 bcan+/+ whole-mount preparations and 4 bcan−/− whole-mount preparations. Scales 5 μm, insets 2.5 μm, *** p < 0.001. Data are presented as median [first quartile, third quartile] in b and as mean ± S.D. in c

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