Abstract

A major polypeptide in the gliosed optic nerves of blinded rats was identified as vimentin, the fibroblastic, 100-Å filament protein typical of mesenchymal cells, by comigration experiments with purified vimentin on SDS-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis. The localization of vimentin to astrocytes was confirmed by immunofluorescence microscopy with vimentin antisera. The distribution of vimentin and of astrocyte-specific glial fibrillary acidic (GFA) protein in cryostat sections of rat brain and spinal cord was different. Vimentin was confined to the main processes of fibrous astrocytes and could not be identified in the delicate framework of glial fibrils demonstrated with GFA antisera. Bergmann radial glia in the molecular layer of the cerebellum were exceptional in this respect, because they were equally well stained with vimentin and GFA antisera.

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