Cell-based immunofluorescence assay for screening the neurogenesis potential of new drugs in adult hippocampal neural progenitor cells.

: Preclinical studies have suggested that increased adult neurogenesis in the hippocampus might have potential therapeutic effects for Alzheimer's disease and depression; therefore, it is a target for the treatment of some brain diseases. In this technical communication, we propose a cell-based fluorescence assay to study the neurogenesis of adult hippocampal progenitor cells that can be used for high-throughput screening of drugs promoting neurogenesis. Three fluorescent dyes (DAPI, Alexa Fluor 488, and Alexa Fluor 594) and a fluorescence spectrophotometry reader were used, which confirmed that the mutual interference of the three fluorescent dyes is very low. We used this cell-based fluorescence assay to evaluate the effects of three neurotrophic factors, ciliary neurotrophic factor (CNTF), insulin-like growth factor 1 (IGF-1), and IGF-2 on the promotion of neurogenesis in adult hippocampal neural progenitor cells. The fluorescence intensity ratio of the neuronal marker, class III β-tubulin, to the housekeeping protein, glyceraldehyde 3-phosphate dehydrogenase, or nuclear staining dye, DAPI, in CNTF-treated cells was significantly higher than in control cells. The ratios in IGF-1 and IGF-2-treated cells were slightly higher under higher cell density conditions. These results are consistent with those in previous reports; therefore, this report proved the efficacy of this method. Taken together, the results showed that this simple, rapid, and economical cell-based immunofluorescence assay could be a powerful tool for the rapid screening of drugs that promote adult neurogenesis.