Abstract

tudied and was well developed but loosely organized at 2 weeks. By 6 and 12 weeks, the sheath was highly compacted and continuous, isolating the probe from the brain. At 2 and 4 weeks, the sheath was disrupted when the probe was removed from the fixed tissue, indicating that cells attached more strongly to the surface of the probe than to the nearby tissue. The later times showed much less disruption. Scanning electron microscopy of the probes showed adherent cells or cell fragments at all time points. Thus, as the sheath became compact, the cells on the probe and the cells in the sheath had decreased adhesion to each other. Immunocytochemistry demonstrated that the sheath was labeled with antibodies to glial fibrillary acidic protein (GFAP), an indicator for reactive gliosis. The tissue surrounding the insertion site showed an increased number of GFAP-positive cells which tended to return to control levels as a function of time after probe insertion. It was concluded that reactive gli

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