Imaging of retina cellular and subcellular structures using ptychographic hard X-ray tomography


METADATA ONLY
Loading...

Date

2021-10

Publication Type

Journal Article

ETH Bibliography

yes

Citations

Altmetric
METADATA ONLY

Data

Rights / License

Abstract

Ptychographic hard X-ray computed tomography (PXCT) is a recent method allowing imaging with quantitative electron-density contrast. Here, we imaged, at cryogenic temperature and without sectioning, cellular and subcellular structures of a chemically fixed and stained wild-type mouse retina, including axons and synapses, with complete isotropic 3D information over tens of microns. Comparison with tomograms of degenerative retina from a mouse model of retinitis pigmentosa illustrates the potential of this method for analyzing disease processes like neurodegeneration at sub-200 nm resolution. As a non-destructive imaging method, PXCT is very suitable for correlative imaging. Within the outer plexiform layer containing the photoreceptor synapses, we identified somatic synapses. We used a small region inside the X-ray-imaged sample for further high-resolution focused ion beam/scanning electron microscope tomography. The subcellular structures of synapses obtained with the X-ray technique matched the electron microscopy data, demonstrating that PXCT is a powerful scanning method for tissue volumes of more than 60 cells and sensitive enough for identification of regions as small as 200 nm, which remain available for further structural and biochemical investigations.

Publication status

published

Editor

Book title

Volume

134 (19)

Pages / Article No.

Publisher

Company of Biologists

Event

Edition / version

Methods

Software

Geographic location

Date collected

Date created

Subject

X-ray; Imaging; Neurodegeneration; Retina; Synapse; Tomography

Organisational unit

02891 - ScopeM / ScopeM check_circle

Notes

Funding

Related publications and datasets