EXPRESSION OF ALPHA-TUBULIN GENE IN MOTONEURONS OF SPINAL-CORD DURING NERVE REGENERATION

We have previously reported that the injury of sciatic nerve causes not only the change of axonal ultrastructures [1,2], but also the increase of beta tubulin gene expression in the neural soma[3]. And the microtubule, as a carrier of transported materials, of axonal architecture plays an important role[4]. It has also been found that the content and transported velocity of tubulin in the regeneration nerve increase significantly owing to the requirements of axonal reconstruction[5,6]. As the NOR-Ag staining technique is specific for the detection of intranuclear silver-philic protein particles and the amount of NOR-Ag staining particles is proportional to the synthesis of rRNA, the NOR-Ag staining particles can partially indicate the nuclear transcription function[7]. Therefore, we observed the transcriptional function of motoneurons in the spinal cord further and focused on alpha tubulin gene expression after crushing the sciatic nerve.