Virginia Commonwealth University Medical School 3 articles published in JoVE Cancer Research Preparation of Human Tissues Embedded in Optimal Cutting Temperature Compound for Mass Spectrometry Analysis April E. Boyd1, Jeremy Allegood2, Santiago Lima1,3 1Department of Biology, Virginia Commonwealth University, 2VCU Lipidomics/Metabolomics Shared Resource, Virginia Commonwealth University School of Medicine, 3Massey Cancer Center Sphingolipids are bioactive metabolites with well-established roles in human disease. Characterizing alterations in tissues with mass-spectrometry can reveal roles in disease etiology or identify therapeutic targets. However, the OCT-compound used for cryopreservation in biorepositories interferes with mass-spectrometry. We outline methods to analyze sphingolipids in human tissues embedded in OCT with LC-ESI-MS/MS. Neuroscience HSV-Mediated Transgene Expression of Chimeric Constructs to Study Behavioral Function of GPCR Heteromers in Mice Terrell Holloway1, Jose L. Moreno1, Javier González-Maeso1,2,3,4 1Department of Psychiatry, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, 2Department of Neurology, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, 3Friedman Brain Institute, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, 4Department of Physiology and Biophysics, Virginia Commonwealth University Medical School This article describes how to inject viral vectors into the mouse frontal cortex to test behavioral assays that require GPCR heteromeric formation. Behavior Rodent Brain Microinjection to Study Molecular Substrates of Motivated Behavior Ryan S. Poland1, Cecilia Bull1, Wahab A. Syed1, M. Scott Bowers1,2 1Virginia Institute for Psychiatric and Behavioral Genetics, Department of Psychiatry, Virginia Commonwealth University School of Medicine, 2Institute for Drug and Alcohol Studies, Departments of Psychiatry, Pharmacology, and Neuroscience, Virginia Commonwealth University School of Medicine Rodents are an appropriate model to investigate the molecular substrates of behavior and complex psychiatric disorders. Brain microinjection in awake rodents can be used to elucidate disease substrates. An efficient and customizable brain microinjection method as well as the execution of an operant paradigm that quantifies motivation is presented.
