Figure 2.

proNGF is upregulated and released after kainic acid treatment in slice culture. a, proNGF was undetected in CA1 under control conditions (top row). However, in response to KA treatment, proNGF was highly upregulated throughout the CA1, near areas of PI-positive staining. Western analysis (b) and quantification (c) of tissue from slice cultures detected very low levels of proNGF in control conditions. However, KA induced a 1.5-fold increase in proNGF detection in slice tissue by 8 h following treatment. Error bars represent SEM. *p = 0.031 relative to control. Mature NGF was strongly detected in both control and treated conditions but did not show significant differences in expression levels in response to KA. In culture medium, low levels of proNGF were found in control conditions but were nearly doubled by 8 h following KA stimulation, reaching 2.5-fold increase by 24 h. Extracellular mature NGF was not detected. Error bars represent SEM. *p = 0.047 relative to control. Data were analyzed using ANOVA, followed by Student–Newman–Keuls post hoc test. Each graph represents the densitometric index of immunoblots from three independent experiments normalized to actin and expressed relative to control levels.