For pan-neuronal labeling in the DRG, I’ve moved to Neurotrace, which is a fluorescent Nissl stain. The different colors have variable staining qualities. Here is Neurotrace Blue. I used 1:200 diluted in PBS for 10 mins at room temp. I do a quick wash in PBS and then mount.
I’ve found the Far red Neurotrace to be good too.
The Green Neutrotrace is very strong, but it also stains non-neuronal nuclei too (like real Nissl). I’ve found the blue and Far red to do that less.
This is 1:100 in spinal cord Nissl Green
20 mins at RT. 1x wash with PBS
Blue is nice because you don’t have to take up the green channel. That’s good since we very rarely use a secondary fluor that is blue. It’s generally FITC/488, Cy3 and Cy5 in our lab. So you can do 4 colors this way, assuming you exclude DAPI.