Differential ethanol sensitivity of intraocular cerebellar grafts in long-sleep and short-sleep mice

The relative importance of extrinsic and intrinsic factors for the differential sensitivity of Purkinje neurons in long-sleep (LS) and short-sleep (SS) lines of mice was investigated using cerebellar grafts to the anterior chamber of the eye. Cerebellar anlagen from fetal LS and SS donors survive and mature in oculo when grafted within and across lines. Mature cerebellar transplants from all four groups contained Purkinje cells that show sustained spontaneous discharge; excitation and inhibition are readily evoked by electrical stimulation of the surface of the graft. Superfusion of ethanol into the anterior chamber depresses Purkinje cell discharge, but neurons from LS donors are approximately 1 order of magnitude more sensitive than SS neurons; this differential sensitivity is unaltered by the host recipient line used. These data strongly suggest that the differential sensitivity of Purkinje cells to ethanol in the LS and SS mouse lines is an intrinsic property of the cerebellum.