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. Author manuscript; available in PMC: 2015 Sep 3.
Published in final edited form as: Neuron. 2014 Aug 21;83(5):1058–1072. doi: 10.1016/j.neuron.2014.07.024

Figure 5. Spontaneous and Evoked Calcium Dynamics in Astrocytes in vitro.

Figure 5

(A) A cortical astrocyte expressing tdTomato and GCaMP5G. (B) Representative individual traces of GCaMP5G fluorescence changes (ΔF/F0) in spontaneous astrocyte activity. White-dotted circles in panel A correspond to ROIs in the soma and processes. (C) Histogram comparing the mean spontaneous calcium ΔF/F0 in somas and processes (***p<0.0003, unpaired t-test, n=8-24 cells). (D) Histogram comparing the mean frequency of spontaneous calcium transients in astrocyte somas and processes (***p<0.0001, unpaired t-test, n=8-24 cells). (E) Time series of intracellular calcium increases induced by focal application of ATP (100 μM) from a glass pipette (white dotted line) in an acute brain slice prepared from a GFAP-CreER; PC::G5-tdT. The pseudocolor scale displays relative changes in GCaMP5G emission intensity. (F) Representative individual traces of GCaMP5G fluorescence changes (ΔF/F0) in response to ATP administration. The color-coding of the traces matches the colored circles in panel E. (G) Histogram comparing the mean ATP induced calcium increases in somas and processes of astrocytes (***p<0.0001 paired and unpaired t-test before and after ATP or vehicle application, n=8-19 cells). Experiments were performed on 4-8 week old mice. Bar graphs display means ± SEM. See also Movie S3 and S4.