Co-cultivation of astroglial enriched cultures from striatum and neuronal containing cultures from substantia nigra.

A co-cultivation system was developed with neuron-containing (neuron-specific enolase (NSE) positive) primary cultures from the substantia nigra of 15 to 17-day old embryonic rats which were grown 1 mm apart from astroglial-enriched (glial fibrillary acidic protein (GFAp) positive) primary cultures from the striatum of neonatal rats. The astroglial cells went through a morphological differentiation with extension of processes after co-cultivation with the immunohistochemically-identified neuronal cells. The astroglial-enriched striatum cultures showed a higher active uptake of 3H-L-glutamate after co-cultivation for one week, compared to control cultures from striatum. Vmax (nmol X mg protein-1 X min-1 X was 58.4 +/- 8.3 after co-cultivation and 37.2 +/- 6.3 for control cultures. The glutamine synthetase (GS) activity was slightly increased after co-cultivation. The validity and specificity of the results were ensured. The data suggest that astroglial cells in a primary culture are influenced by co-cultivation with fetal neuron containing cultures resulting in morphological differentiation, and increases in 3H-L-glutamate uptake and GS activity.