Figure 2.

Characterization of mouse adrenal chromaffin cells. Dissociated adrenal cells were plated on porn/laminin-coated dishes in serum-free culture medium and analyzed after cell attachment. Double-immunostaining showed that all PHOX2B-positive cells co-express the noradrenergic proteins TH (A) and VMAT1 (B). The chromaffin cell-specific proteins PNMT (C), SGII (D), and DLK1 (E) are expressed in 57 ± 3%, 92 ± 2% and 91 ± 4% of PHOX2B-positive cells, respectively. The neuron-specific proteins L1CAM (F) and TUBB3 (G) are expressed by virtually all chromaffin cells, whereas ISLET1 is only detected in a subpopulation (H), and PERIPHERIN is virtually absent in chromaffin cells (I). Magnification bar, 60 μm.