Focal cerebral ischemia in rats by photothrombosis of cortical microvessels

Among the available animal models of brain ischemia, it is broadly considered that cerebral cortex microvessels thrombosis induced by photochemical method is similar to human cerebral thrombosis. The brain tissues are damaged by the lack of blood and oxygen induced by thrombosis of the microvessels region. In this study, optical intrinsic signal imaging (OISI, at 546plusmn10 nm) was used to investigate the evolution of a photothrombotic lesion to somatosensory cortex. During illumination, we observed clots flow several times in illuminated region vessels, and vessels turned vague, which indicated occlusion is forming. The result of TTC staining shows that the illuminated area was infarct.