Figure 6
From: The adipokine leptin modulates adventitial pericyte functions by autocrine and paracrine signalling
Leptin secretion predicts capillarization outcome of APC therapy in a mouse model of limb ischemia. (a) Representative fluorescent microscopy images of capillary density in muscles injected with vehicle or APCs (bar = 50 μm). Capillaries are stained green with isolectin, myocytes stained red with α-SMA, nuclei are stained blue with DAPI. The LEP levels in conditioned media of hypoxic APC lines were assessed by ELISA. APCs producing higher levels of LEP induced more capillarization than those secreting lower levels of LEP. (b) Regression line showing the association between capillary density in injected skeletal muscles and level of LEP in conditioned media collected from hypoxic APCs (red circles). Vehicle group capillary density is shown as a light blue circle. (C&D) Vascular pericytes (c) and ECs (d) immunosorted from mouse adductor muscles 3 days after limb ischemia (Ischem) showed a significant increase in the expression of the mouse Lepr compared with contralateral normoperfused (Normop) muscles. ***p < 0.001 vs. normoperfused.
