Figure 6
From: Impaired cornea wound healing in a tenascin C-deficient mouse model
Expression of a macrophage marker, F4/80, in an incision-injured cornea of a wild-type (WT) or a tenascin C-null (knockout (KO)) mouse as evaluated by using immunohistochemistry and real-time reverse transcription PCR (RT-PCR). (a) Macrophage distribution by immunohistochemical detection of F4/80 expression. Macrophage is not observed in the uninjured stroma in both WT (A, A′) and KO (B, B′) mice. At day 5 post-incision injury, macrophages are detected in the newly formed granulation tissue in the incision injury and also in the stroma adjacent to the wound in a WT stroma (C, C′), but a few macrophages are seen in a KO stroma (D, D′). At day 10, F4/80-positive macrophage is not seen in the scar tissue formed in the wound of a WT (E, E′). At this timepoint, macrophage is not observed in unhealed stroma of a KO cornea (F, F′). Granulation or scar tissue contain pigment granules (arrows) derived from iris in frames D and E′. Frames A′–F′ show the higher magnification pictures of the quadrilateral area in each of Frames A–F. Nuclear staining, methylgreen; Epi, corneal epithelium; stroma, corneal stroma; glan, granulation tissue; scale bar, 100 μm (A–F) and 30 μm (A′–F′). (b) Relative F4/80 mRNA expression in the cornea of WT and KO mice as examined by real-time RT-PCR. At day 5, mRNA expression of F4/80 is significantly higher in a WT cornea as compared with that in a KO cornea. Its mRNA expression decreases at day 10 as compared with that at day 5 in a WT mouse cornea. A significant difference in the expression level of F4/80 between a WT and a KO samples was not detected at this timepoint. **P<0.01.
