This is a photo of a mouse utricle that has been double-labeled with antibodies against calmodulin (green) and calbindin (red).  The calmodulin labels all of the hair cells in the utricle, while the calbindin labels only the hair cells in the striolar region.

This is a movie of the dissection of the adult mouse utricle.   The utricle is one of the vestibular organs of the inner ear, and it contains sensory hair cells that are similar in structure and function to the hair cells of the cochlea.  The dissection and culture of the mouse utricle are described in: Cunningham, LL (2006) Brain Research May 26;1091(1):277-81.  This movie has been compressed to make the file size small.  If you would like to see this movie in a larger format, please email me at cunninll@musc.edu.