Individual Lobe Extraction from Prostate: A Technique to Harvest Individual Prostate Lobes from Mouse Prostate

In rodents, the prostate gland is located around the base of the urinary bladder and surrounds the top portion of the urethra. The gland has four distinct pairs of lobes. Based on their anatomical orientation relative to the urinary bladder, they are called the ventral, lateral, anterior, and dorsal lobes.

The ventral lobes lie anterior to the urethra and inferior to the bladder. Two lateral prostate lobes, flanking the ventral lobes, reside on both sides of the urethra. The anterior lobes are translucent tubular structures attached to the seminal vesicles. The dorsal lobes, resembling butterfly wings, are positioned on the posterior side at the base of the seminal vesicles.

To harvest individual prostate lobes, begin by taking a mouse's urogenital system in a Petri dish. Use a dissecting microscope to distinguish the different lobes. Position the dorsal side to face upward. Locate the two dorsal lobes. Use scissors to excise them at their base. Now, invert the prostate tissue to face the ventral side. Locate the pair of lateral lobes. Use scissors to snip the lobes and separate them. Next, locate the ventral lobes and excise them. Lastly, separate the anterior lobes present at the top.

Place the tissue, dorsal side up, under a dissecting microscope so that the dorsal lobes, which resemble a butterfly's wings are visible. Holding each dorsal lobe with forceps, cut the tissue at its base with scissors to collect the dorsal lobes, and turn the tissue to the ventral side.

Collect the lateral lobes, which are small and usually wrap the urethra on the side and are wedged between the anterior, ventral, and dorsal lobes in the same manner. Collect the ventral lobes, which are larger than the lateral lobes and lie on the urethra ventrally. Then, cut and discard the urethra to harvest the anterior lobes.