Table 1. Effects of Thapsigargin on Neuronal Cell Death.

Region		Control	Thapsigargin
ChAT	nBM	124 ± 15 (7) -	60 ± 11 (5) **
	dStr	54 ± 12 (7) -	18 ± 5 (5) **
TH	vMes	81±18 (6) -	18 ± 5 (5) ***
DAPI	nBM	9 ± 1 (7) -	30 ± 2 (5) ***
	vMes	12 ± 2 (7) -	49 ± 3 (5) ***
TUNEL	nBM	45 ± 5 (4) -	392 ± 44 (3) ***
	vMes	53 ± 7 (4) -	313 ± 16 (4) ***

A 4 week old co-culture brain slice, composed of the basal nucleus of Meynert (nBM), the dorsal striatum (dStr), the cortex (Ctx) and the ventral mesencephalon (vMes), was incubated with 3 μM thapsigargin for 24 hr and then for further 3 days in without. Subsequently, the slices were fixed, stained for choline acetyltransferase (ChAT) or tyrosine hydroxylase (TH) or DAPI or DNA fragments were labelled in situ using the TUNEL assay. The number of ChAT/TH or DAPI-positive nuclei with apoptotic morphology or TUNEL-positive nuclei were counted on a random field (260 μm × 190 μm) per slice are given as mean ± S.E.M.; the values in parenthesis give the number of analyzed slices. Statistical analysis was performed by one way ANOVA with a Fisher PLSD posthoc test (*** p<0.001; ** p<0.01).