Autoradiography as a Simple and Powerful Method for Visualization and Characterization of Pharmacological Targets

Summary

The method of autoradiography is routinely used to study binding of radioligands to tissue sections for determination of qualitative or quantitative pharmacology.

Abstract

In vitro autoradiography aims to visualize the anatomical distribution of a protein of interest in tissue from experimental animals as well as humans. The method is based on the specific binding of a radioligand to its biological target. Therefore, frozen tissue sections are incubated with radioligand solution, and the binding to the target is subsequently localized by the detection of radioactive decay, for example, by using photosensitive film or phosphor imaging plates. Resulting digital autoradiograms display remarkable spatial resolution, which enables quantification and localization of radioligand binding in distinct anatomical structures. Moreover, quantification allows for the pharmacological characterization of ligand affinity by means of dissociation constants (K_d), inhibition constants (K_i) as well as the density of binding sites (B_max) in selected tissues. Thus, the method provides information about both target localization and ligand selectivity. Here, the technique is exemplified with autoradiographic characterization of the high-affinity γ-hydroxybutyric acid (GHB) binding sites in mammalian brain tissue, with special emphasis on methodological considerations regarding the binding assay parameters, the choice of the radioligand and the detection method.

Introduction

Autoradiography is a method which provides images of radioactive decay. The technique is routinely used to study the tissue distribution of a protein of interest in vitro based on a specific pharmacological interaction between a radiolabelled compound and its target. This provides direct information about the selectivity of the ligand for the target. In vitro autoradiography may also be used for quantitative determination of pharmacological binding parameters of radioligands, such as the dissociation constant (K_d) and density of binding sites (B_max), as well as for determining the inhibition constant (K_i) of competing....

Protocol

All animal handling was performed in compliance with the guidelines from The Danish Animal Experimentation Inspectorate.

NOTE: The protocol described here covers tissue preparation (i.e., mouse brain tissue), the in vitro autoradiographic assay in sufficient detail for setting up the method in a new lab, the exposure to phosphor imaging plates as well as subsequent densitometric analysis of autoradiograms (Figure 2) with the aim of localizing and quantifying radioligand binding in distinct anatomical structures. For histological comparison, a protocol for cresyl violet staining is included. Mo....

Results

Using the described protocol, the anatomical distribution of the high-affinity GHB binding sites was visualized with the radiolabelled GHB analogue [³H]HOCPCA in mouse brain, which was cut into coronal, sagittal and horizontal sections (Figure 3). High levels of binding were observed in hippocampus and cortex, lower binding in striatum and no binding was detected in cerebellum, corresponding to previous reported expression patterns of the high-affi.......

Discussion

The quality of an autoradiographic assay is most often determined by the sensitivity of the radioligand. A major contributing factor is the selected radioisotope, which is given by the availability of known ligands or by the feasibility of specific labelling techniques to yield ligands with appropriate specific activity (i.e., the amount of radioactivity per unit mole of a radioligand)²³and with limited amounts of chemical degradation. A large number of radioligands of known ligands are l.......

Materials

List of materials used in this article

Name	Company	Catalog Number	Comments
Absolute ethanol	Merck Millipore	107017
Acetic acid	Sigma-Aldrich	A6283
BAS-TR2040 Imaging Plate	GE Healthcare Life Science	28956481	20x40 cm - Sensitive to tritium
Cresyl violet acetate	Sigma-Aldrich	C5042-10G
DPX (non-aqueous mounting medium for microscopy)	Merck Millipore	100579
O.C.T. Compound, 12 x 125 mL	Sakura	4583	Tissue-Tek
Paraformaldehyde	Sigma-Aldrich	16005-1KG-R
Superfrost Plus slides	VWR	631-9483	microscope slides
Tissue-Tek Manual Slide Staining Set	Sakura Finetek Denmark ApS	4451
Tritium Standard on Glas	American Radiolabeld Chemicals, Inc.	ART 0123
Xylene substitute	Sigma-Aldrich	A5597