Ultrastructural analysis on acetylcholinesterase localization in the cerebellar cortex of teleosts

Abstract

The histochemical localization of acetylcholinesterase (AChE) was studied by electron microscopy in the cerebellar cortex of the goldfish and the catfish. The patterns of enzyme distribution show noticeable differences in the two teleost species at the level of the corresponding cerebellar structures. Among the most distinctive features in the prevailing intracellular localization of enzyme activity in the goldfish and the prevailing extracellular localization in the catfish in the molecular layer and, to a lesser extent, the granular layer. Only quantitative differences in the ability to synthesize AChE can be recorded among the different cerebellar neurons in the two species, since all these neurons exhibit different amounts of enzyme activity linked to their cytoplasmic structures. Comparing the results obtained with those of previous histochemical, experimental and developmental researches, the hypothesis seems well founded that the embryonic pool of cerebellar neurons is made up to AChE-synthesizing neuroblasts which, during development, lose or maintain to a different degree the mechanisms for AChE synthesis. In addition the light and electron microscope histochemistry reveals at different levels of resolution that the final pattern of AChE distribution in the cerebellar cortex is the sum of different degrees of AChE synthesis by cerebellar neurons and different degrees of enzyme release in extracellular spaces.