Fig. 1
From: Cav2.3 channels contribute to dopaminergic neuron loss in a model of Parkinson’s disease
Cav2.3 is abundantly expressed in mature SN dopaminergic neurons. a Left: Representative images showing Cav2.3 (red) and tyrosine hydroxylase (TH; green) RNAScope fluorescence signals (combined with nuclear DAPI staining, blue) of individual SN dopaminergic neurons from an adult wildtype mouse. Scale bar: 10 µm. Right: Absolute mRNA transcript numbers per cell in adult SN dopaminergic neurons for distinct voltage-gated Ca2+ channel α-subunits, as indicated (Cav1.2: n = 667, Cav1.3: n = 537, Cav2.1: n = 425, Cav2.2: n = 461, Cav2.3: n = 435, Cav3.1: n = 657, Cav3.2: n = 573, Cav3.3: n = 498). b Left: Juvenile and adult mouse brain sections before and after UV-laser microdissection, in brightfield and fluorescent mode, respectively, and striatal injection site documentation of an in vivo retrogradely traced adult mouse, aligned with the mouse brain atlas. Scale bars: 250 µm and 10 µm, respectively. Right: Cell-specific UV-laser microdissection and reverse transcription quantitative PCR-based transcript molecule quantification in single mouse SN dopaminergic neurons upon aging for Cav1.2# (juvenile: n = 26; adult: n = 25), Cav1.3# (juvenile: n = 24; adult: n = 24) (#data partly modified from ref. 37), and Cav2.3 (juvenile: n = 13; adult: n = 27). c Left: Confocal images showing Cav2.3 antibody staining (red) of TH-positive (green) neurons in SN and VTA of an adult wildtype mouse, respectively. Scale bar: 10 µm. Middle: Histogram showing the immunosignal intensity distributions of plasma membrane Cav2.3 signal, and respective background signal intensities for all analyzed TH-positive SN (red) and VTA (blue) neurons, exemplary of one C57BL/6J mouse (SN: n = 145; VTA: n = 128). Right: Mean Cav2.3 immunosignal quantification in SN and VTA dopaminergic neurons for all analyzed mice (n = 4). Antibody specificity was confirmed on Cav2.3 knockout mice. Tukey's box plots are shown. Significances are indicated by asterisks: *p < 0.05, **p < 0.01, ***p < 0.001, ****p < 0.0001. All data are detailed in Supplementary Tables 1, 4A, 5A/B and Supplementary Fig. 6. Source data are available as a Source Data file
