Fig. 6

Microglial CD68 and L-ferritin expression follow pTDP-43 aggregation in motor cortex and hippocampus of rNLS mice. Immunohistochemical labelling was used to visualise microglial, anatomical, and pathological markers in the of bigenic NEFH-tTA/tetO-hTDP-43∆NLS (rNLS) and single transgenic tetO-hTDP-43∆NLS (control) mice at 2, 4, and 6 weeks off DOX. Example images of the motor cortex (A–D) and hippocampus (E–J) from mice at 6 weeks of DOX are shown; microglia were labelled with CD68 (green), L-ferritin (magenta), and Iba1 (red), pathology with pTDP-43 (yellow), and neurons with NeuN (white), with a Hoechst nuclear counterstain (blue); scale bar A = 100 µm and scale bar B = 20 µm. Microglial cell density (K), pTDP-43 load (L), and the percentage of CD68^high (M) and L-ferritin^high (N) microglia were quantified in the hippocampus and motor cortex of control and rNLS mice 2, 4, and 6 weeks off DOX (K). All data presented as mean ± SD; control n = 4–6 and rNLS n = 2–5. Measurements were compared between case groups at each time point with a 2-way ANOVA and multiple comparisons were corrected for using Bonferroni’s multiple comparisons test. Significance of differences between case groups: *p ≤ 0.05, ** p ≤ 0.01, ***p ≤ 0.001, ****p ≤ 0.0001