Fig. 9
Reduced inflammation and axonal damage upon clomipramine treatment. Vehicle-treated animals had marked parenchymal inflammation, indicated by an arrow (a), whereas clomipramine-treated animals only had low meningeal inflammation (b). This was reflected in better histological scores (g) evaluated by a previously described method54 (a, b: Hematoxylin/eosin and luxol fast blue, HE and LFB). Vehicle-treated animals had pronounced microglial activation (Iba1 stain, c), which was accompanied by axonal damage with formation of axonal bulbs (indicated by an arrow, Bielschowsky stain, e). Clomipramine treatment reduced microglial activation concomitant with preserved axonal integrity (d, f). This was reflected in a blinded rank order analysis (h, i). Infiltration and microglial activation positively correlated with axonal damage (j, k). c/e and d/f are adjacent sections. Images are shown in 20-times and 40-times original magnification. The scale bars show 100 µm. Non-parametric two-tailed Mann–Whitney test (g–i) and non-parametric two-tailed Spearman correlation with 95% confidence interval (j, k). Significance is shown as **p < 0.01; ***p < 0.001
