Figure 6

Immunization with AFF 1 ameliorates the neurodegenerative pathology in MBP-α-syn tg mice. (A) Immunostaining for the synaptic marker MAP2 (green) in the neocortex and striatum of non-tg mice or MBP-α-syn tg mice immunized with vehicle, original C-terminal α-syn antigen or AFF 1. Cell nuclei were stained with DAPI (blue). Scale bar = 5 μm (B) Quantification of the percentage of the MAP2-positive area of neuropil in neocortex (C) Quantification of the percentage of the MAP2-positive area of neuropil in striatum (D) Immunostaining for the neuronal marker NeuN in the neocortex and striatum of non-tg mice or MBP-α-syn tg mice immunized with vehicle, original C-terminal α-syn antigen or AFF 1. Scale bar = 5 μm (E) Quantification of NeuN-positive cell counts per 0.1 mm³ in neocortex (F) Quantification of NeuN-positive cell counts per 0.1 mm³ in striatum. Results are expressed as average ± SEM. (*) p < 0.05 when comparing vehicle-treated non-tg animals to tg groups by one-way ANOVA with post hoc Dunnett; (#) p < 0.05 when comparing vehicle-treated tg animals with immunized tg groups by one-way ANOVA with post hoc Tukey-Kramer. For the non-tg group, animal numbers were n = 5 for vehicle and n = 3 for AFF 1. For tg groups, n = 10 animals per group.