Transplantations of newborn CNS fragments into the brain of shiverer mutant mice: extensive myelination by transplanted oligodendrocytes. II. Electron microscopic study.

As already demonstrated by immunohistochemistry, oligodendrocytes from newborn normal mice are able to survive, migrate and myelinate when transplanted into the newborn shiverer (shi/shi) mouse brain. The survival of the grafted cells and their interaction with the host brain were studied at different times after transplantation. Normal myelin was found in the host parenchyma basing our observation on the morphological difference between normal and shiverer myelin: the shiverer myelin deprived of major dense line appears uncompacted as compared to normal myelin. Myelin formed by transplanted oligodendrocytes was detected around the graft and, after immunohistochemical prelocalization, at considerable distance from the site of implantation. Normal and shiverer myelin were detected around axons adjacent to each other or around the same axon. These results confirm and extend at the ultrastructural level our previous data obtained by immunohistochemistry.