Animals and surgery
We purchased adult male 2–8 week ICR mice from Nantong University Experimental Animal Center. They could eat and drink and were kept in the animal facility, which temperature is 22℃. The Animal Care and Use Committee of Nantong University reviewed and approved all animal handling in this study. Animals were selected and divided into different groups randomly, namely the operation, the control and the sham. The operation underwent ligation of the left infraorbital nerve with 8-0 line through an intraoral incision. Only the left infraorbital nerve was isolated and exposed without ligation in the sham. The control received no surgical intervention.
Behavior test
Mice will be tested in a quiet and comfortable environment and acclimatized 3 days in advance. Each test takes place at 3:00 pm on the same day and acclimates 30 minutes beforehand. Series of graded Von Frey fibers were used for mechanical stimulation of the left mandibular region (the smallest filament was 0.02 g, the largest was 1.4 g). Each filament was stabbed 5 times, and a rapid withdrawal or avoidance of the mouse after the fiber was bent would be considered a positive response. When there were more than 3 positive reactions, the size of the filament was recorded as the pain threshold of the mouse. In the whole experiment, in order to reduce the stimulation to the mice, the time of each prick was controlled at 10 seconds, and each prick was performed after the mice were calm.
Quantitative PCR (qPCR)
We extracted total RNA from the TG using Trizol reagent (Invitrogen, Carlsbad, CA, USA), which was noted before. We used a real-time detection system (Rotor Gene 6000, Qiagen) and SYBR Green I dye to detect quantitative polymerase chain reaction (qPCR) (Takara, Japan). We used these primers: β-Actin, TNF-α, IL-1β and Anxa10 (forward Primer, ATGTTTTGCGGGGAATATGTCC; reverse Primer , CAATCAGCATGTCTTTGTTGCAG). PCR amplification was made for 3 min at 95°C, then we made 40 cycles at 95°C for 10 seconds and 60°C for 30 seconds. We normalized with β-Actin as an internal control and calculated mRNA levels using the −ΔΔCt method (2−ΔΔCt ).
Western blots
We perfused the mice with normal saline. Ipsilateral TG tissue was isolated and triturated homogenate containing protease inhibitors (Promega, Madison, WI, USA) of the lysate. Test protein concentration by BCA protein assay. Similar to previous experiments(Lu et al. 2016), We performed sodium dodecyl polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis and Western blotting on the obtained protein samples. We used the following antibodies: Anxa10 (rabbit, 1:500, Bioss Inc) and β-actin (mouse, 1:20000, Millipore, Billerica, MA). We incubated blots with HRP-conjugated secondary antibodies. Finally, we used an Odyssey infrared imaging system (LI-COR, Lincen, NE, USA) to quantify the intensities of the spectral bands, showing the bands on the films.
Immunofluorescence staining
The mice were anesthetized far gone with sodium pentobarbital (50 mg/kg, intraperitoneal) and perfused with normal saline and formaldehyde, we isolated the trigeminal ganglia of the mice for immunofluorescence staining. TG tissue was cut (10 μm) using a cryostat. And take a similar approach for immunostaining (Lu et al. 2016). We used the following antibodies: Anxa10 (Boster Biotechnology, rabbit, 1:200), TUJ1 (R&D Systems, mouse, 1:500, ), GFAP (Millipore, mouse, 1:5000), CD11b (AbD, mouse) , 1:50) and IBA-1 (Wako, Rabbit, 1:3000). We incubated sections with Cy3 or Alexa 488-conjugated secondary antibodies (Jackson, 1:1000). For negative controls, we ignored the primary antibody and incubated the sections with only the secondary antibody. Finally, we examined the stained sections by microscopy (Leica SP8) and obtained pictures.
Trigeminal ganglion microinjection
IntraTG microinjection of recombinant lentivirus covering Anxa10 shRNA1 (LV-Anxa10-shRNA1, 5'-CTG AAC TTT GAC AGA ACC T-3'), Anxa10 shRNA2 (LV-Anxa10-shRNA2, 5'-CTG AAC TTT GAC AGA ACC T -3') Anxa10 shRNA3 (LV-Anxa10-shRNA3, 5'-CTG AAC TTT GAC AGA ACC T-3') or negative control shRNA (LV-NC, 5'-TTC TCC GAA CGT GTC ACG T-3' ) by using the pGCSIL-GFP vector. During the intra-TG microinjection, the mice were far gone anesthetized with sodium pentobarbital (50 mg/kg, intraperitoneal), and after stabilizing the mouse's head, the needle tip was placed at an angle of 10°parallel to the midline of the head, Inward puncture and through the infraorbital foramen, through the round foramen to reach the brain, touch part of the inner wall of the cranial fossa, and then slowly inject 6 µL of lentivirus.
Complete Trigeminal Ganglion Patch Clamp Recording
We isolated and cultured mouse trigeminal neurons and recorded changes in cell membrane excitability by patch clamp. Briefly, the trigeminal ganglia of mice were isolated after anesthesia with isoflurane,, the fibrous membrane covering the surface of the ganglion was removed, and the ganglia were grown in Dulbecco's modified Eagle's medium (DMEM, Gibco, Grand Island, NY). Incubate at 37˚C for 0.5 hours. Then add to DMEM containing 10% fetal bovine serum (FBS, Gibco, Grand Island, NY) and vortex gently with a 1 ml pipette tip. Finally, detached cells were seeded on poly-D-lysine-coated glass coverslips for 3 min in DMEM/FBS supplemented with 10% FBS and 30 ng/mL nerve growth factor. The seeded cells were placed in a cell incubator at 37˚C with 5% carbon dioxide.
We recorded trigeminal ganglion neurons after the culturing of 8 to 16 hours in accordance with the previous description. Small diameter TG neurons (<25 mm) were chosen to record current diaphragm clamp at room temperature. The bath solution and the pipette solution are same as previous experiment.The resistance of the glass electrode after fire polishing is controlled at 4-8MΩ.We acquired the data by applying a HEKA EPC-10 amplifier, Pulse software (version 8.80; HEKA Elektronik, Lambrecht, Germany). Then evoked the action potentials (APs) by depolarizing current steps (1000 ms in duration and 10 pA increments). The signals were low-pass filtered at 5 kHz, then sampled at 20 kHz, and analyzed offline ultimately.
Quantification and Statistics
Results are demonstrated as the mean ± SEM. We analyzed the behavioral statics by double-way repeated measures (RM) ANOVA following with the Bonferroni test. We analyzed the qPCR data by Student’s t-test. Image J software (NIH) was used to test the density of specific bands in Western blots. We compared the differences between two communities by applying Student’s t-test. We used the GraphPad Prism v8.0 for statistical explanation, and considered P < 0.05 was significant.