Fig. 7

Loss of ERG expression correlates with EndMT in end-stage human liver disease. a Representative immunofluorescence of human liver sections stained for SMA (green), CD31 (grey scale; red in merge), ERG (white) and DAPI (blue) were captured from non-fibrotic donor patients with chronic end‐stage NASH, PBC and ALD with enlarged merge panel. Filled white arrows identify CD31⁺ERG⁺ EC whereas empty white arrows show CD31⁺ERG⁻ EC (Scale bar 50 µm). b Quantification of SMA, CD31 and ERG expression (five fields per section, n = 4–5). Scale bar 20 μm. Data were compared to non-fibrotic group (*) by one-way ANOVA and Dunnett’s comparison post-test. c Representative images for CD31 (Red) and SMA (green) staining, showing co-localisation indicative of EndMT (arrows) and their pixel co-localisation profile in ALD, PBC and NASH patient samples. d Quantification of pixel co-localisation of CD31 (Red) and SMA (green) by overlap co-efficient was correlated with ERG expression for all individual human section data, non-fibrotic (black circles), NASH (purple squares), PBC (blue triangle down) and ALD (red triangle up). Correlation was calculated by linear regression, resulting in a significant negative correlation. All graphical data are mean ± s.e.m., *P < 0.05