Immunohistochemistry of cholinergic receptors.

Acetylcholine and its receptors are involved in a variety of important signal transduction processes. As shown here paradigmatically for the human neuromuscular junction and the cerebral cortex, acetylcholine receptors can be visualized immunohistochemically at the cellular and subcellular level under physiological and pathological conditions. At normal motor endplates nicotinic cholinoceptors are localized at the surface of the postsynaptic junctional folds. In myasthenic syndromes investigation of muscle biopsies enables the diagnosis of receptor deficiencies at the ultrastructural level. In normal cerebral cortex pyramidal neurons are equipped with both nicotinic and muscarinic acetylcholine receptors localized to postsynaptic densities. In neuropsychiatric diseases cholinoceptor expression can be monitored at the cellular level by quantitative assessment of immunolabeled cortical neurons.