RIKEN Center for Integrative Medical Sciences 1 article published in JoVE Neuroscience Purification of the Dendritic Filopodia-rich Fraction Yutaka Furutani1,2, Yoshihiro Yoshihara3 1Laboratory for Neurobiology of Synapse, RIKEN Brain Science Institute, 2Liver Cancer Prevention Research Unit, RIKEN Center for Integrative Medical Sciences, 3Laboratory for Systems Molecular Ethology, RIKEN Center for Brain Science In this protocol, we introduce a method for purifying the dendritic filopodia-rich fraction from the phagocytic cup-like protrusion structure on cultured hippocampal neurons by taking advantage of the specific and strong affinity between a dendritic filopodial adhesion molecule, TLCN, and an extracellular matrix molecule, vitronectin.