Figure 4.

Selective ablation of adult DG neurogenesis by Cre-dependent viral vectors. A, Cre-dependent AAV-DTA (left) was applied to inhibit adult neurogenesis in nestin-Cre mice. AAV-mCherry (right) was used as the control virus. B, Restricted mCherry expression in the SGZ of dDG (left) or vDG (right). Subjects with off-target expression were excluded from additional analysis. Scale bars, 100 μm. C, Representative double-labeling images of mCherry (expressed by AAV-mCherry) with nestin, BrdU, DCX, GFAP, or NeuN. n = 5 in each group. Scale bars, 50 μm. Arrowheads point to colabeled neurons. D, E, AAV-DTA decreased nestin-, BrdU-, and DCX-positive cells in the dDG or vDG, without affecting GFAP- or NeuN-positive cells. n = 10 in each group. Scale bars, 100 μm. F, AAV-DTA decreased BrdU-positive newborn cells in the SGZ of dDG or vDG under EE-VEx, with BrdU injected intraperitoneally 16–20 d after virus injection. n = 5 in each group. **p < 0.01, t test.