Rat striatal astroglia induce morphological and neurochemical changes in adult bovine,adrenergic-enriched adrenal chromaffin cells in vitro

Abstract

Adult bovine chromaffin cells are generally resistant to plastic changes when exposed to various culture media. Here, we demonstrate that adrenergic-enriched bovine chromaffin cell populations show significant process extension when co-cultured with fetal rat brain glial fibrillary acid protein (GFAP)+, fibronectin astroglia. Basal medium was ineffective in promoting such growth in chromaffin cells. Initial process formation could be observed about 24 h after seeding, while well developed processes were seen after 3-4 days. Intimate contacts of cytoplasmic extensions with adrenergic chromaffin cells, or with astroglial cells, were frequently observed. Both co-culture with glial cells or exposure to glia-conditioned medium led to a significant increase in noradrenaline and adrenaline, but not in dopamine content. Since bovine chromaffin cells are widely used as models to study fundamental mechanisms of neurosecretion and phenotype transformation, their co-culture with astroglia may provide a useful strategy to study such phenomena.