Isolated Exposure in Brain Slices
Copyright – Journal of Neuroscience Methods, DOI: 10.1016/j.jneumeth.2013.08.012
The BioPen (formerly the Multifunctional pipette) was used to administer pharmacologically active substances to selected areas in brain slices with high spatio-temporal resolution. The method utilized the hydrodynamically confined flow of the active chemical compound, to locally stimulate neurons, in conjunction with electrophysiological recording techniques. This enabled diverse superfusion experiments, testing the effects of different drug concentrations or candidates, on selected neurons in different cell layers with high positional accuracy. The technique was demonstrated in conjunction with electrophysiological recordings of pyramidal cells in hippocampal and prefrontal cortex brain slices from rats, to determine electric responses dependence with the delivery site. It was found that a multi-fold gain in solution exchange time could be achieved in comparison to whole slice perfusion. In addition, localized solution delivery by using the BioPen reduces the reagent consumption, while allowing more data to be collected from a single tissue slice, thus reducing the number of laboratory animals to be sacrified for a study.