Figure 4
Extracellular vesicles secreted by neonatal cardiosphere-derived cells (CDC-EVs) induce broad systemic effects and prolong survival of old rats. (A) Changes in maximal exercise capacity over follow-up period show a steady decrease in the control group, but an initial improvement and subsequent preservation in CDC-EV-treated animals. (B) Kaplan-Meier survival curves show that after 65 days, 91.7% of rats survived in CDC-EV-group compared with 57.1% in PBS group; latency to death was nearly 3 times longer in vesicle-treated rats compared with placebo. (C) Representative lower limb skeletal muscle sections stained with Masson’s trichrome. (D) Pooled data shows that CDC-EV-group (n = 7) has less fibrosis than control PBS (n = 7). (E) Representative lung sections stained with Masson’s trichrome. (F) Pooled data shows that CDC-EV-group (n = 7) has less fibrosis than control PBS (n = 7). (G) Representative kidney sections stained with Masson’s trichrome. (H) Pooled data shows that CDC-EV-injected rats (n = 5) have lower number of sclerotic glomeruli/field versus PBS group (n = 5). All significant p-values are shown. Colored values (blue in CDC-EV and red in PBS groups, respectively) represent the significance of the difference between baseline and the specific time-point within the group estimated with paired Student’s t-test. Black values represent the significance between the groups at the same time-point estimated with two tailed Student’s t-test. Data presented are means ± s.e.m.
