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Updated: May 29, 2025
A High Output Method to Isolate Cerebral Pericytes from Mouse
Published on: January 14, 2020
Screening and Identification of Brain Pericyte-Selective Markers
Minkyung Kang1, Ava Nasrollahi1, Feng Cheng2
1Department of Molecular Pharmacology and Physiology, Morsani College of Medicine, University of South Florida, Tampa, Florida, USA.
Background:
Pericytes, a type of mural cells, exert important functions in the CNS. One major challenge in pericyte research is the lack of pericyte-specific and subpopulation-specific markers.
Methods:
To address this knowledge gap, we first generated a novel transgenic mouse line in which vascular smooth muscle cells (vSMCs) are permanently labeled with tdTomato. Next, we isolated PDGFRβ+tdTomato- pericytes and PDGFRβ+tdTomato+ vSMCs from the brains of these mice and subsequently performed RNAseq analysis to identify pericyte-enriched genes.
Results:
Using this approach, we successfully identified 40 pericyte-enriched genes and 158 vSMC-enriched genes, which are involved in different biological processes and molecular functions. Using ISH/IHC analysis, we found that Pla1a and Cox4i2 were predominantly enriched in subpopulations of brain pericytes, although they also marked some non-vascular parenchymal cells.
Conclusions:
These findings suggest that Pla1a and Cox4i2 preferably label subpopulations of pericytes in the brain compared to vSMCs, and thus, they may be useful in distinguishing these populations.
