how microglia reduce PNN after nerve injury

To determine how microglia reduce PNN after nerve injury, researchers divided a new cohort of
mice into two groups. When we removed microglia from one group, we found that these mice
did not show hypersensitivity after mechanical injury, whereas mice in the control group did.
PNNs enable highly specific modulation of pain signal output in the spinal cord, and when
microglia degrade her PNNs, projection neuron activity increases.

See Perineural Networks: Mechanisms Controlling

Brain Plasticity. They deleted the PNN's core protein, known as aggrecan, by injecting mice with
a rAAV virus that deleted the gene encoding aggrecan. For comparison, another projection
neuron from the same mouse was also injected with AAV-Cre and a Cre-dependent adeno-
associated virus expressing chondroitinase ABC, which degrades the sugar side-chain
glycosaminoglycans that bind PNNs. . After depleting glycans and protein aggrecans from
projection neurons in mice, mice were assessed for thermal hypersensitivity and spontaneous
pain by facial expressions.