Fig. 4

3D reconstruction of brainstem microglia and their morphometric analysis. a Coronal section through the medulla outlining the region from which Iba1-positive microglia were selected for 3D morphometric analysis (arrow, right; broken red line, left) MDRN: Medullary reticular nucleus, dorsal part. Image reproduced from the Allen Brain Atlas. b Representative 3D-reconstructed microglia from aged WT (Terc^+/+), G3Terc^-/-, αSYN^tg/tg mice and αSYN^tg/tg G3Terc^-/- mice. c Morphometric analyses of reconstructed microglia. Six different parameters relating to process length and branching were analysed using Imaris Bitplane software. For a more detailed description of the measurement characteristics, see Additional file 5: Figure S4. Five Iba1-positive microglia per animal were reconstructed and analyzed, and 4–5 animals were included in each group. Mean group values + SEM are depicted. A one-way ANOVA with a post-hoc LSD test was applied to determine significant differences between groups. *p < 0.05. b Scale Bar = 10 μm