Development of a novel in vivo imaging system and its application to place cells

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In the present work, we tried to develop a novel in vivo imaging system, which can be equipped with a freely moving animal for a long period, to understand higher brain functions.We first made green fluorescence protein (GFP)-expressing lentivirus vector, and then injected it to mouse hippocampus CA1 region. A few weeks later, strong GFP signals were observed in the region of the acute slice under a fluorescence microscope. In addition, the lentivirus infection had no influence on electrophysiological properties, including long-term potentiation (LTP) expression, of GFP-expressed neurons. Next, we tried to observed fluorescence images of the similar slice via gradient index (GRIN) lens, however, the images were faint. GRIN lens is thought to play a key role in in vivo imaging system because it transfer the images from the inside of the brain to the outside. In the future, therefore, it is necessary to improve the system by increasing signal-to-noise ratio.