Fig. 5: Acomys exhibit cardiac tissue preservation in response to myocardial infarction.

a Representative images of Masson’s trichrome stained long-axis left ventricular cavity sections of Mus (C57BL6 and CFW) and Acomys 50 days post-MI (scale bar = 500 μm). Quantification of the infarct size, corresponding to the ratio between infarcted length and left ventricular length showing significantly smaller scar in Acomys compared to Mus strains (N = 17 Mus-C57BL6, 11 Mus-CFW, and 5 Acomys, values are means ± S.E.M, *P < 0.05 by one-way ANOVA and Tukey’s multiple comparison test). b Representative images of picrosirius red stained scar center 50 days after MI across species showing reduced alignment of collagen fibers in Acomys compared to Mus species. Both Mus strains show highly compressed, parallel collagen fibers, while Acomys fibers show more porosity between fibers and a wavy organization. Quantification of minimum and maximum scar thickness showing that Acomys has on average a comparatively thicker scar compared to Mus strains (N = 3 animal/group, values are means ± S.E.M, **P < 0.01 by one-way ANOVA and Tukey’s multiple comparison test). There was no statistically significant difference in maximum scar thickness. c DAPI images were obtained in the center of the scar and demonstrate higher cellularity in Acomys compared to Mus strains (scale bar = 100 μm in upper panel and 10 μm in lower panel, yellow boxes indicating insets). Quantitative analysis showed higher density of nuclei and scar percentage cellularity in Acomys vs. Mus strains (N = 3 animal/group, values are means ± S.E.M, **P < 0.01 by one-way ANOVA and Tukey’s multiple comparison test).