Chronic hM3Dq signaling in microglia ameliorates neuroinflammation in male mice

William Binning; Aja E. Hogan-Cann; Diana Yae Sakae; Matthew Maksoud; Valeriy Ostapchenko; Mohammed Al-Onaizi; Sara Matovic; Wei-Yang Lu; Marco A. M. Prado; Wataru Inoue; Vania F. Prado

Sociability was assessed as previously described (Kwon et al., 2006) . Briefly, testing was done in a three-chambered apparatus (15×90×18.5 cm divided into three chambers of 15×29 cm and separated by dividers with a central 3.8×3.8 cm door) (Med Associates, St. Albans, VT, USA) that offers the subject a choice between a social stimulus and an object. Mice were first habituated for 10 min to the three-chamber apparatus and two empty metal mesh cylinders at each end (Leite et al., 2016) . Mice were then locked in the center of the chamber for 5 min, during which a novel object (green lego block) was placed under the cylinder at one end, and a juvenile mouse of different background was placed under the cylinder at the other end. During the 10 min task, time spent investigating the object and the juvenile mouse was defined as the time a mouse spent sniffing through the holes of either cylinder and was manually scored by an investigator blind to the treatment. In baseline experiments, data were analyzed using student's t-test. In LPS experiments, data were analyzed using repeated measures two-way ANOVA with Bonferroni post hoc analysis.