Figure 4.

Boundaries of nuclei in the dorsal thalamus at the level of the ventral posterior nucleus in the short-tailed opossum. As in the previous figure, three different stains were used to delineate boundaries; CO (A), Nissl (B), and vGluT2 (C), with reconstructions derived from these stains illustrated in (D). The ventral posterior complex, including VPm and VPl can be seen as a darkly staining region in CO (A) and vGluT2 (C) stained tissue, with VPm staining more darkly. VMb can be seen medial to VP as a lightly stained line of tissue between two darkly stained sections. Lateral to VP, eml stains lightly in all three series. At this level of the thalamus, Pol is intermingled with eml. As in Figure 3, LGNd and LGNv are lateral to the ventral posterior complex, and are most apparent in CO (A) and vGluT2 (C) stained tissue. Near the midline, PF can be seen in CO (A) and vGluT2 (C) stained tissue, being slightly darker than the surrounding nuclei. Finally, dorsal to VMb and medial to VP, the caudal extent of VM could be identified as a lightly stained nuclei in all three series. Conventions as in Figure 3.