Efficient single muscle fiber isolation from alcohol-fixed adult muscle following β-galactosidase staining for satellite cell detection

Mayank Verma, Atsushi Asakura

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

7 Scopus citations

Abstract

Staining for β-galactosidase activity for whole tissues, sections, and cells is a common method to detect expression of β-galactosidase reporter transgene as well as senescence-dependent β-galactosidase activity. Choice of fixatives is a critical step for detection of β-galactosidase activity, subsequent immunostaining, and enzymatic digestion of tissue to dissociate cells. In this report, the authors examined several aldehyde and alcohol fixatives in mouse skeletal muscle tissues for their efficiency at improving detection of β-galactosidase activity as well as detection by immunostaining. In addition, fixatives were also analyzed for their efficiency for collagenase digestion to isolate single muscle fibers on postfixed β-galactosidasestained whole skeletal muscle tissues. The results show that fixing cells with isopropanol yields the greatest reliability and intensity in both β-galactosidase staining as well as double staining for β-galactosidase activity and antibodies. In addition, isopropanol and ethanol, but not glutaraldehyde or paraformaldehyde, allow for the isolation of single muscle fibers from the diaphragm and tibialis anterior muscles following postfixed β-galactosidase staining. Using this method, it is possible to identify the amount of cells that occupy the satellite cell compartment in single muscle fibers prepared from any muscle tissues, including tibialis anterior muscle and diaphragm.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Pages (from-to)60-67
Number of pages8
JournalJournal of Histochemistry and Cytochemistry
Volume59
Issue number1
DOIs
StatePublished - Jan 2011

Keywords

  • Cell therapy
  • Fixative
  • LacZ
  • Muscle stem cell
  • Muscular dystrophy
  • Myogenesis
  • Regeneration
  • Satellite cell
  • Single muscle fiber
  • β-galactosidase

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