This protocol describes a method for registration of in vivo cortical retinotopic map with cytochrome c oxidase (CO) labeled architectonic maps of the same mouse brain through the alignment of vascular fiducials. By recording surface blood vessel pattern and sequential alignment at each step, this method overcomes the challenge imposed by tissue distortion during perfusion, mounting, sectioning and histology procedures. This method can also be generalized to register and align other types of in vivo functional maps like ocular dominance map and spatial/temporal frequency tuning map with various anatomical maps of mouse cortex.
Keywords: Architectonic map; Cortex flattening; Cytochrome c oxidase; Registration; Retinotopic map; Tangential section; Vasculature.