Serum-Deprivation Induces Cell Death of Rat Cultured Microglia Accompanied With Expression of Bax Protein.

Abstract

Expression of Bcl-2 related proteins in rat microglial primary culture was examined. At relative low cell densities, serum deprivation caused cell death and nuclei condensation of cultured microglia. Expression of a pro-apoptotic protein, Bax, but not Bcl-2, was increased by the serum deprivation. SB203580, a specific inhibitor of p38MAPK, prevented both the serum deprivation-induced Bax expression and microglial death. Immunochemical staining showed that microglia expressing a high level of Bax were subjected to apoptosis-like cell death. These observations suggest that Bax expression underlies the apoptosis of cultured microglia after serum deprivation.

Development of Neonatal Murine Microglia In Vitro: Changes in Response to Lipopolysaccharide and Ischemia-Like Injury

“…Chromatin condensation was previously described in serum-deprived cultured microglia with comparable levels of cell death to our findings (34). In contrast, few studies have been done on injury-induced release of cytokines by developing microglia.…”

Osteopontin directly modulates cytokine expression of primary microglia and increases their survival

“…Microglia kept in serum free conditions have been observed to undergo apoptotic cell death (Koyama et al , 2000). We thus speculate that OPN might also enhance microglia survival under the stress of nutrient deprivation after cerebral ischemia.…”

Extracellular histone H1 is neurotoxic and drives a pro-inflammatory response in microglia

“…Mixed glial cultures were made from explants of cerebral cortices of P3 (3 day post-natal) Wistar rats as described previously 20, 21 . Briefly, after mechanical and chemical dissociation cells were plated in DMEM 10% (v/v) fetal bovine serum at a density of 500,000 cells/ml and cultured at 37°C in humidified 5% (v/v) CO 2 /95% (v/v) air.…”