Immunohistochemical investigations on the course of astroglial GFAP expression following human brain injury

The course of GFAP expression by astrocytes has been immunohistochemically investigated during the first 30 weeks after human brain injury. Ln order t o provide reliable data for a forensic wound age estimation, a quantitative morphometric analysis was performed considering the different topographic regions of the cortex as well as of the white matter Compared to the GFAP i mmunoreactivity in unaltered control tissue, significantly increased number s of GFAP positive astroglial cells could be detected adjacent to the corti cal contusion from 1 day up to 4 weeks after brain injury.