Fig. 1: Visualization of sympathetic nerves in mouse lacrimal gland.

a Schematic diagram of tissue clearing and fluorescence imaging. Created in BioRender. Wang, Q. (2025) https://BioRender.com/9ijvlqg. b Lacrimal gland before (left) and after (right) tissue clearing. c Representative images of immunolabeling by anti-TH with anti-CD31 and anti-Mist1. Scale bar, 200 μm. The experiment was repeated at least three times independently with a similar result. d Representative images of immunolabeling using anti-TH with anti-E-cadherin (ECAD), anti-aSMA and anti-Axna1. Distribution analysis of TH⁺ nerve fiber density in acinar and ductal area of lacrimal gland (n = 11 mice per group. P = 0.0006). Scale bar, 20 μm. e Representative image and quantitative analysis of immunolabeling using anti-TH and anti-choline acetyltransferase (ChAT) (n = 10 mice per group. P < 0.0001). Scale bar, 20 μm. f Representative image and quantitative analysis of immunolabeling using anti-TH and anti-synaptophysin (SYP) (n = 10 mice per group. P > 0.9999). Scale bar, 20 μm. All white arrows indicate TH-labeled sympathetic nerves. Data are shown as mean ± SEM. The significance of differences was detected using unpaired two-sided Student’s t test (d–f). ***P < 0.001, ns, not significant. Source data are provided as a Source Data file.