Extended Data Fig. 10: Both female groups showed higher pDAT in the NAc and lower mesocortical projection density in the mPFC layer 2/3 compared to male dominants.
a, Timeline for the immunofluorescence analysis. b, Representative images of TH-positive terminals in the mPFC for female mice. Scale bar = 400 μm. c, Relative fluorescence density of TH-positive signals in the PrL, ACC, IL and the entire mPFC, normalized to paired subordinate (n = 7 pairs of female mice). Two-sided paired t test, *P < 0.05, **P < 0.01. d, Percentage of PrL covered by TH-positive terminals for male (n = 9 pairs) and female (n = 7 pairs) mice. Unpaired t test, *P < 0.05. e, Representative images of TH-positive terminals in the PrL regions across different cell layers for female mice. Scale bar = 200 μm. f, Percentage of the PrL area covered by TH-positive terminals across different layers for male (n = 9 pairs) and female (n = 7 pairs) mice. Two-way ANOVA, **P < 0.01, followed by Tukey’s test, *P < 0.05, ***P < 0.001. g, Timeline for the protein dectection. h, Representative western blot image showing expression of DAT, pDAT and GAPDH from NAc tissue samples of female rats. i, Relative expression levels of proteins in the NAc of female rats, normalized to paired subordinate (n = 8 pairs). j, Relative expression levels of pDAT in the NAc for male (n = 8 per group) and female (n = 6 per group) rats, normalized to GAPDH. Unpaired t test, ***P < 0.001. Data are represented as mean ± s.e.m. Detailed statistical information is available in Supplementary Table 1.
