Quantitative study of cellular and volumetric growth of magnocellular and laminar auditory nuclei in developing chick brainstem

Development of the second and third order auditory nuclei-nucleus magnoscellularis (NM) and nucleus laminaris (NL) respectively-was studied using Nissl stained serial sections from brain specimens between 8 day of incubation and posthatch day 1, at every two day interval. Reconstruction of these nuclei from three incubation ages showed progressive growth of both nuclei in a rostrocaudal direction. The volume, total neuron, dead cell and glial cell numbers were estimated using stereological quantitation methods. Both nuclei, while undergoing an overall gradual increase in volume up to 20 days registered a transient drop in volume; earlier for NM at 10 days and later for NL at 18 days. From day 20 the two nuclei showed accelerated growth in volume. The total neuron count rapidly declined up to 12 days with 43% loss of neurons in NM followed by a rise and later stabilization within a certain range. The NL, however, showed a continuous fall in neuron numbers throughout the incubation period with 20% cell loss by day 12 and an overall loss of 52%. Cell death in both nuclei was maximal at 16 days and spanned the entire period of incubation. Glia showed a biphasic increase with peak at 14 days for both NM and NL followed by a subsequent rise at day 20 for both nuclei. These data would help in planning further experimental studies of auditory manipulation