TY - JOUR T1 - High fidelity cryopreservation and recovery of primary rodent cortical neurons JF - eneuro JO - eNeuro DO - 10.1523/ENEURO.0135-18.2018 SP - ENEURO.0135-18.2018 AU - Sara S. Parker AU - Aubin Moutal AU - Song Cai AU - Sambamurthy Chandrasekaran AU - Mackenzie R. Roman AU - Anita A. Koshy AU - Rajesh Khanna AU - Konrad E. Zinsmaier AU - Ghassan Mouneimne Y1 - 2018/09/13 UR - http://www.eneuro.org/content/early/2018/09/13/ENEURO.0135-18.2018.abstract N2 - Cell cryopreservation improves reproducibility and enables flexibility in experimental design. Although conventional freezing methodologies have been used to preserve primary neurons, poor cell viability and reduced survival severely limited their utility. We screened several high-performance freezing media, and found that CryoStor®10 (CS10) provided superior cryoprotection to primary mouse embryonic cortical neurons compared to other commercially-available or traditional reagents, permitting the recovery of 68.8% of cells relative to a fresh dissection. We characterized developmental, morphometric and functional indicators of neuron maturation, and found that, without exception, neurons recovered from cryostorage in CS10 media faithfully recapitulate in vitro neurodevelopment in-step with neurons obtained by fresh dissection. Our method establishes cryopreserved neurons as a reliable, efficient, and equivalent model to fresh neuron cultures.Significance Statement: In this study, we have optimized and validated a methodology for the efficient cryopreservation of primary embryonic rodent neurons, yielding cells which are developmentally and functionally similar to fresh neurons. This approach serves as an effective alternative to regularly obtaining neurons by fresh dissection, and thus frees researchers from substantial labor and animal husbandry costs, enables flexibility in experimental timelines, and conserves animals. ER -