Fig. 6: Altered membrane-bound SCF on MSPCs and ECs, and altered cKit signaling in HSCs of mice with CXCR4-deficient MPPs.

a Kitl mRNA expression. Normalized Kitl RNA counts in MSPCs (left); and Kitl-GFP expression in gated LEPR⁺ MSPCs (right) of Flk2-cre.Cxcr4^fl/+ Kitl^GFP/+ (black), and Flk2-cre.Cxcr4^fl/fl Kitl^GFP/+ (red) mice (n = 4 mice/group). b Gating strategy of LEPR⁺ MSPCs and ECs, and mSCF measurements by flow cytometry. c, d mSCF geometric mean fluorescent intensity (GMFI) on LEPR⁺ MSPCs (c) and ECs (d) from Flk2-cre.Cxcr4^fl/+ (black) and Flk2-cre.Cxcr4^fl/fl (red) mice (n = 4 mice/group). e Overlay of mSCF on gated LEPR⁺ MSPCs isolated from indicated mice (left), mSCF quantification (right, n = 3 mice/group). f HSC numbers in bone marrow. Gray, Flk2-cre.Cxcr4^fl/+Kitl^GFP/+ (n = 3) Black, Flk2-cre.Cxcr4^fl/+Kitl^+/+ (n = 6); Red, Flk2-cre.Cxcr4^fl/fl Kitl^+/+ (n = 4); Pink, Flk2-cre.Cxcr4^fl/fl Kitl^GFP/+ (n = 7). g pSTAT3 (left) and pSTAT5 (right) levels in HSCs isolated from Flk2-cre.Cxcr4^fl/+ (black, pSTAT3 n = 3, pSTAT5 n = 4) and Flk2-cre.Cxcr4^fl/fl (red, pSTAT3 n = 4, pSTAT5 n = 5) mice. h cKit⁺ cell number in bone marrow (i) mSCF levels on LEPR⁺ MSPCs (n = 3/group). (H and I) Mice were treated with 200 µg of isotype (black) or ACK2 antibody (red) for 3 days (n = 3/group). Data in panel (a) are from one bulk RNA sequencing experiment with n = 4 samples/group. Data in panels (b–i) are representative of two or more experiments. Bars indicate average, circles depict individual mice. *P < 0.05; **P < 0.01 and ***P < 0.001 by unpaired two-sided Student’s t test. Source data are provided as a Source Data file.