Figure 7.

In vivo live imaging of acute axonal degeneration in the rat optic nerve. (a) Schematic drawing of the experimental setup. The optic nerve was crushed with a suture and then imaged in vivo on the proximal and distal side of the crush for 6 h. Single axons from retinal ganglion cells were labeled with EGFP expressed by AAV that were injected intravitreally 4 weeks before the imaging. (b) Low magnification micrograph of an exposed optic nerve before crush lesion. The suture is loosely tied around the nerve. Single EGFP-positive axons can be identified. (c and d) Quantification of the AIR at the given time-points after crush lesion on the proximal (c) and distal side (d) of the crush (n=15 axons from three independent experiments per group). Statistics: one-way ANOVA followed by Dunnett's post hoc test, *P<0.05, **P<0.005, ***P<0.0005. Error bars represent means±S.E.M. (e) Representative composite images of projected z-stack micrographs of optic nerves transduced with AAV.EGFP, AAV.αSyn-WT or AAV.αSyn-A30P at the time points after crush lesion given on top