Developing patterns of nitric oxide synthesizing neurons in the rat striatum: histochemical analysis.

The prenatal and postnatal development of NADPH-diaphorase (NADPH-d)/neuronal nitric oxide synthase (nNOS) positive neurons was studied in the striatum of rats. NADPH-d was demonstrated enzyme histochemically and nNOS immunohistochemically using a polyclonal antibody. NADPH-d neurons appeared in the ventrolateral part of the striatum on embryonic day 18 (E18). Thereafter, the number of NADPH-d neurons increased and began to distribute homogeneously in the striatum. The density of NADPH-d neurons became highest at postnatal day 5 (P5) and then decreased as the volume of the striatum continued to increase. The number of NADPH-d neurons reached its peak around 3-4 weeks after birth. The sizes of NADPH-d neurons were measured. The NADPH-d neurons grew larger until P14 (mean area 260 microm(2)) and became smaller thereafter (mean area 170 microm(2)). Patches of high NADPH-d activity and tyrosine hydroxylase (TH) immunoreactivity were also examined in the developing striatum. The distributions of NADPH-d patches overlapped with those of TH-immunoreactive patches by P10. The spatiotemporal appearance of nNOS and overlapping of nNOS patchy distribution with TH point to an important role of NO and to an interaction between nNOS and DA fibers during development of the striatum.