The effect of retinal ablation on qualitative and quantitative changes of calbindin D28k and GABA expression in the contralateral optic tectum was studied in young chicks. Fifteen days old chicks had unilateral retinal ablation and after 7 or 15 days, calbindin expression was analyzed by Western blot and immunocytochemistry. Neuronal degeneration was followed by the amino-cupric silver techniqu...

Calbindin D28k has been reported to be involved in the transcellular calcium transport along the rat distal tubule. It has also been shown that chronic metabolic acidosis (CMA) induces significant hypercalciuria. The present study investigated whether CMA affects the mRNA and the protein expression of calbindin D28k along isolated distal tubule (DT) of rats. The animals were made acidotic by ad...

Ischemic preconditioning elicited by a non-fatal brief occlusion of blood flow has been applied for an experimental therapeutic strategy against a subsequent fatal ischemic insult. In this study, we investigated the neuroprotective effects of ischemic preconditioning (2-minute transient cerebral ischemia) on calbindin D28k immunoreactivity in the gerbil hippocampal CA1 area following a subseque...

The preplate of the cerebral cortex contains projection neurons that connect the cortical primordium with the subpallium. These are collectively named pioneer neurons. After preplate partition, most of these pioneer neurons become subplate neurons. Certain preplate neurons, however, never associate with the subplate but rather with the marginal zone. In the present overview, we propose a novel ...

Ground squirrel retinas were immunostained with antibodies against calcium binding proteins (CBPs) and classical neurotransmitters in order to describe neuronal phenotypes in a diurnal mammalian retina and to then compare these neurons with those of more commonly studied nocturnal retinas like cats' and rabbits'. Double immunostained tissue was examined by confocal microscopy using antibodies a...

The expression pattern of aromatase (ARO), the enzyme converting androgens to estrogens, was analyzed in the olfactory bulb of adult male rats and was compared with the distribution of estrogen receptor beta (ERbeta), the main estrogen receptor isoform expressed in this brain region. A strong ARO immunolabeling obtained with a specificity tested antibody was observed in juxtaglomerular neurons ...

Major depressive disorder is a common and complex mental disorder with unknown etiology. GABAergic dysfunction is likely to contribute to the pathophysiology since disrupted GABAergic systems are well documented in depressed patients. Here we studied structural changes in the hippocampal GABAergic network using the chronic mild stress (CMS) model, as one of the best validated animal models for ...

The mammalian claustrum is involved in processing sensory information from the environment. The claustrum is reciprocally connected to the visual cortex and these projections, at least in carnivores, display a clear retinotopic distribution. The visual cortex of dolphins occupies a position strikingly different from that of land mammals. Whether the reshaping of the functional areas of the cort...

Neuroimaging and neuropsychological studies have revealed that the primary motor cortex (PMC) and the extramotor cortical areas are functionally abnormal in motor neuron disease (MND, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis), but the nature of the cortical lesions that underlie these changes is poorly understood. In particular, there have been few attempts to quantify neuronal loss in the PMC and in othe...

The basal ganglia (BG) contain several functional compartments and multiple, parallel segregated circuits processing different cortical information through cortical-BG-thalamus-cortical loops. Three zones of corticostriatal input are present: sensorimotor, associative and limbic, which correspond to poor, intermediate and strong calbindin (CB) labelling, respectively. Other functional compartme...