A comparative analysis of reactive Müller glia gene expression after light damage and microRNA-depleted Müller glia – focus on microRNAs [NanoString]

In order to identify the miRNAs in adult light damaged Muller glia of the the neural retina, we isolated the Müller glia from Rlbp-CreER: Stopf/f-tdTomato by means of fluorescent activated cell sorting and analyzed their miRNAs using NanoStrings Technologies®. We compared the data to that from and Dicer1-CKO Müller glia and wild type glia Müller glia (GSE103098). We found three miRNAs potentially regulating genes involved in stress response in both data sets. Fluorescence activated cell sorting (FACS) was used to purify adult light damaged Müller glia (pooled from 44 retinas, > postnatal day 21), using an Müller glia specific cre-lox labeling strategy by crossing Rlbp1-CreER with tdTomato mice. The RNA was extracted from purified Müller glia (tdTomato+) and miRNA expression was analysed using NanoString and nCounter Technologies ®.