NTPDase2 as a Surface Marker to Isolate Flow Cytometrically a Müller Glial Cell Enriched Population from Dissociated Neural Retinae

Müller glial cells are large neuroglial cells that extend throughout the entire retina, they function to maintain homeostasis and retinal integrity. In teleost fish, in response to retinal damage, Müller cells can re-enter the cell cycle, dedifferentiate and regenerate neuronal cells. Therefore, increasing our knowledge about these cells might open new avenues to regenerative medicine. Here, we present a reliable method to isolate Ectonucleoside triphosphate diphosphohydrolase 2 (NTPDase2) positive Müller glial cells by FluorescenceActivated Cell Sorting (FACS). For this, cell suspensions were made from immature and mature mouse neural retinae by incubation in collagenase I and DNase I and repeated trituration. We confirmed by flow cytometry that glutamine synthetase positive Müller glial cells were also NTPDase2 positive. Thereafter, the surface marker NTPDase2 was used to sort by FACS a population enriched for Müller glial cells. NTPDase2 successfully marks an enriched population of glutamine synthetase positive cells. This is a reproducible method to sort Müller glial cells from mouse retina. The FACS isolated Müller glial cells can be used to study their properties in retinal degeneration, regeneration and cell function.