Fig. 4: Piezo1-GOF mutation in the brain vasculature impairs blood flow increase during somatosensory stimulation.

a Crossbreeding scheme used to generate inducible, brain EC-specific Piezo1-GOF (Piezo1^cx/cx;Slco1c1-Cre+) mice. Tamoxifen-treated Cre+ mice were used as GOF, and littermate Cre- mice were the control. b Schematic illustrations of different whisker stimulation paradigms during LSCI recordings (thinned skulls), with the contralateral somatosensory barrel cortex highlighted (green). c Representative traces of FH responses to air puffs (5 Hz, 30 s each) in a control and a Piezo1^cx/cx;Slco1c1-Cre+ mouse. d Scatter plot of CBF increases during 30 s air puff whisker stimulation in control (n = 9) and brain EC-GOF (n = 10) mice. Right: area under the curve analyses (control: 28 whisker stimulations; GOF: 32 stimulations). e, f Representative responses and summary data of hyperemic responses to 5 s whisker stimulation using air puffs (n = 12 control; 10 brain-EC-GOF). Area under the curve analyses compare 39 stimulations in brain-EC-GOF mice and 35 stimulations in controls. g Averaged scatter plots of FH responses to manual stimulation (n = 8 control; 7 brain-EC-GOF) or motor stimulation (n = 9 control; 10 brain-EC-GOF). h Examples and averages of baseline blood flow in the hemispheres of control (n = 19) and brain-EC-GOF (n = 14) mice. All statistical tests were unpaired Student’s t test (two-sided, *P < 0.05, **P < 0.01, ***P < 0.001, ****P < 0.0001). All error bars are SEM. Scatter plot data in d, g, f, h are presented as mean ± SEM. Area under the curve data in d and g are presented as histograms. Source data are provided as a Source Data file.