Neuroanataomical Patterning of Inhibitory Neurons over Time in Transgenic Zebrafish

Science Center, Bent Corridor

Inhibitory neuron alterations are a consistent finding in a number of neurodevelopmental disorders, including autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Determining how genetic and environmental factors influence inhibitory neuron development may help reveal ASD molecular mechanisms. Transgenic zebrafish reporter lines labeling GABA or glycine neurons have recently been developed to assess inhibitory neuron development in vivo; the expression patterning of these lines has not been well described. The purpose of this project is to characterize the fluorescent protein expression (GFP) to establish baseline patterns for comparison with experimental manipulations and compare their neuron patterning to other methods. We hypothesize that (1) the patterning of inhibitory neurons changes over time in these fish, (2) the transgenic line neuron patterns match reported results using other techniques, and (3) GABA and glycine transgenic lines label different neuron populations. Zebrafish larvae were imaged using brightfield and fluorescence microscopy from 1 day post-fertilization (dpf) up to 5 dpf; spatial and temporal patterns were then compared with existing data on GABA and glycine neuron neuroanatomy. Initial results indicate increasing expression of marker expression up to 5dpf and variable GFP expression patterns among embryos. Characterizing the spatial patterning of these transgenic reporter line over time can inform experimental design for testing the impact of ASD-associated factors on inhibitory neuron neurodevelopment.