Media 6 - Intersegmental axonal projections of sacral somatic motor neurons

<p dir="ltr">A subset of <b>axons </b>of sacral somatic motor neurons that innervate the <b>tail and levator ani (Tail9)</b> possess intersegmental projections. These axons initially project laterally in the transverse plane before turning at a right angle and continuing within the ventrolateral white matter tracts to the next segment, either L6 or S2.</p><p dir="ltr">Visualization of motor neurons was achieved through whole tissue immunolabelling and clearing using a modified form of <b>iDISCO</b> for spinal cord. Motor neurons were immunolabelled via <b>choline acetyltransferase (ChAT)</b>. Large volume imaging was performed on the <b>light sheet microscope</b> with a 12x lens (Ultramicroscope II, Miltenyi Biotec). Neurons and axons were traced using Neurolucida 360's (MBF Bioscience) <i>User Guided</i> tree tracing function, with <i>Directional Kernels</i> the tracing algorithm of choice.</p>