Fig. 4
Effects of prenatal PM2.5 exposure on morphological development of dendrites and mRNA expression of synaptic markers in male offspring. (a) Representative images of Golgi-Cox-stained dendrites on PNDs 7 and 21. Bar = 200 μm; (b) Sholl analyses of dendritic complexity on PND 7 (n = 21 neurons from 3 mice of different litters); (c) Sholl analyses of dendritic complexity on PND 21 (n = 21 neurons from 3 mice of different litters). (d) Representative images of Golgi-Cox stained dendritic spines on PNDs 7 and 21. Bar = 10 μm. (e) The percentage of each spine morphological category (filopodium, thin, stubby, and mushroom) on PNDs 7 and 21 (n = 15 neurons from 3 mice of different litters). (f) Quantification of dendritic spine density was calculated as the number of spines per 10-µm dendrite length (n = 17–20 neurons from 3 mice of different litters). (g) mRNA expression of Psd95 on PNDs 1, 7, and 21. (h) mRNA expression of Syp on PNDs 1, 7, and 21. (n = 4–6 from 4 to 6 litters)