Antibody-dependent Fos-like immunoreactivity (FLI) in the auditory pathway of the rat in response to electric stimulation of the cochlea.

The distribution of Fos-like immunoreactivity (FLI) in the auditory pathway was analyzed and quantified in two groups of rats subjected to a similar electric stimulation of the cochlea, but the brains of the two groups were treated with a different antibody against Fos. The brains of control (unstimulated) rats were processed and analyzed in the same way. In a given auditory nucleus, for the same paradigm of stimulation, a very different density of FLI can be found depending on the antibody used to process the tissue. There are auditory nuclei which exhibited a significant activation of FLI as compared to control animals when one antibody was used whereas there was no difference when using the other antibody. In other cases, for both antibodies, a significant FLI increase was observed in relation to the stimulus. However, the increase of FLI density was significantly greater in some auditory nuclei with one antibody, while it was the reverse in other auditory nuclei. The present data demonstrate quantitatively that the use of two different Fos antibodies can strongly affect the FLI produced in the auditory pathway by electric stimulation of the cochlea, confirming previous qualitative observations based on acoustic stimulation of the cochlea.