Non-invasive imaging of GFAP expression after neuronal damage in mice

Up-regulation of glial fibrillary acidic protein (GFAP) expression is often used as a surrogate marker of neuronal damage. We have created a transgenic mouse line that carries the luciferase gene under the transcriptional control of the mouse GFAP promoter. Biophotonic imaging was used to non-invasively detect the increase in GFAP expression after kainic acid induced neuronal cell death. We demonstrate that after kainic acid treatment, strong biophotonic signals were detected from the brain area. This correlated with both endogenous GFAP and luciferase RNA levels as well as with hippocampal cell death observed histologically. The transgenic mouse line will provide a powerful tool to dynamically monitor neuronal cell death in the living animal and will aid in the discovery and development of drugs to treat damage due to stroke and other neurodegenerative diseases.