1. Neuroscience

nNOS-expressing interneurons control basal and behaviorally-evoked arterial dilation in somatosensory cortex of mice

  1. Christina Echagarruga
  2. Kyle W Gheres
  3. Jordan N Norwood
  4. Patrick J Drew  Is a corresponding author
  1. Pennsylvania State University, United States
https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.60533
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  1. Christina Echagarruga
  2. Kyle W Gheres
  3. Jordan N Norwood
  4. Patrick J Drew
(2020)
nNOS-expressing interneurons control basal and behaviorally-evoked arterial dilation in somatosensory cortex of mice
eLife 9:e60533.
https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.60533
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Abstract

Cortical neural activity is coupled to local arterial diameter and blood flow. However, which neurons control the dynamics of cerebral arteries is not well understood. We dissected the cellular mechanisms controlling the basal diameter and evoked dilation in cortical arteries in awake, head-fixed mice. Locomotion drove robust arterial dilation, increases in gamma band power in the local field potential (LFP), and increases calcium signals in pyramidal and neuronal nitric oxide synthase (nNOS)-expressing neurons. Chemogenetic or pharmocological modulation of overall neural activity up or down caused corresponding increases or decreases in basal arterial diameter. Modulation of pyramidal neuron activity alone had little effect on basal or evoked arterial dilation, despite pronounced changes in the LFP. Modulation of the activity of nNOS-expressing neurons drove changes in the basal and evoked arterial diameter without corresponding changes in population neural activity.

Data availability

The Matlab code and data to generate the figures have been uploaded to Dryad. The DOI for download is here:https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.b8gtht79hPrior to final acceptance, the Matlab code and data to generate the figures is available here:https://datadryad.org/stash/share/c_aYm6WfvBEeWk4W473h_YFFINirRoS_HgIvsWA2ccM

Article and author information

Author details

  1. Christina Echagarruga

    Bioengineering Graduate Program, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, United States
    Competing interests
    The authors declare that no competing interests exist.

  2. Kyle W Gheres

    Molecular Cellular and Integrative Biosciences program, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, United States
    Competing interests
    The authors declare that no competing interests exist.

  3. Jordan N Norwood

    Cellular and Developmental Biology Graduate Program, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, United States
    Competing interests
    The authors declare that no competing interests exist.
    ORCID icon "This ORCID iD identifies the author of this article:" 0000-0001-8093-5938

  4. Patrick J Drew

    Engineering Science and Mechanics, Biomedical Engineering, and Neurosurgery, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, United States
    For correspondence
    PJD17@PSU.EDU
    Competing interests
    The authors declare that no competing interests exist.
    ORCID icon "This ORCID iD identifies the author of this article:" 0000-0002-7483-7378

Funding

National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (R01NS078168)

  • Patrick J Drew

National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (R01NS101353)

  • Patrick J Drew

National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (F31NS105461)

  • Jordan N Norwood

The funders had no role in study design, data collection and interpretation, or the decision to submit the work for publication.

Reviewing Editor

  1. Anusha Mishra, Oregoh Health and Science University, United States

Ethics

Animal experimentation: This study was performed in strict accordance with the recommendations in the Guide for the Care and Use of Laboratory Animals of the National Institutes of Health. All procedures were performed in accordance with protocols approved by the Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee (IACUC) of Pennsylvania State University (protocol # 201042827). All surgeries were performed under isoflurane anesthesia and every effort was made to minimize suffering.

Version history

  1. Received: June 29, 2020
  2. Accepted: October 2, 2020
  3. Accepted Manuscript published: October 5, 2020 (version 1)
  4. Version of Record published: October 14, 2020 (version 2)

Copyright

© 2020, Echagarruga et al.

This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License permitting unrestricted use and redistribution provided that the original author and source are credited.

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  1. Christina Echagarruga
  2. Kyle W Gheres
  3. Jordan N Norwood
  4. Patrick J Drew
(2020)
nNOS-expressing interneurons control basal and behaviorally-evoked arterial dilation in somatosensory cortex of mice
eLife 9:e60533.
https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.60533

Share this article

https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.60533

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