Isolation of inflammatory cells from rat brain tissue after stroke

The pathophysiology of sterile inflammation following focal ischemic stroke is complex and not fully understood, but there is growing evidence that it offers several therapeutic options beyond the hitherto existing treatment strategies. The identification and quantification of infiltrating inflammatory cells in animal models of stroke is crucial both for understanding post-stroke inflammation and for drug target identification. Multicolor flow cytometry plays an important role in determining subtypes and quantity of leukocytes that infiltrate the brain tissue after stroke. Until now, most investigations have been performed in mice, most likely due to a significantly broader spectrum of disposable antibodies and available knockout models. Here, we introduce a specific and reproducible method to isolate leukocytes from rat brain specimen in the context of brain ischemia to ultimately allow multi-dimensional flow cytometric characterization and further downstream methods such as cell-subtype sorting and molecular biological approaches.