Figure 3.

Dendritic spine loss is most pronounced near amyloid plaques. Analysis of dendritic spine density in 12 Tg2576 and 4 control animals shows an overall reduction of 27.7% in Tg2576 cortex compared to control. Spine loss is even more dramatic near plaques with a 54.3% decrease in spine density within 15 μm of a plaque edge compared to control and a 37.5% decrease compared to dendrites farther from plaques (a). Spine densities are reported as the mean±standard deviation from the mean (^* ANOVA F[1,72]=12.371, p = 0.0008; ^** Bonferroni post-hoc test p < 0.0001). A scatter plot of spine density data from Tg2576 mice (b) shows a positive correlation between density and distance from a plaque (Pearson’s correlation coefficient 0.411, p = 0.0015). Even at great distances from a plaque edge, dendritic spine density is reduced compared to control density (dotted line).