Fig. 5

Localised microanalysis revealed spatial patterns of airway mucus obstruction in βENaC-tg mice. Representative images of microanalysis, which was performed on SRCT datasets acquired from selected sections of the left lung of an adult mouse from the βENaC-tg subset, providing high-resolution insights into the spatial distribution of mucus accumulation. An extensive post-processing pipeline was used to segment airways and mucus, allowing the calculation of two key parameters for each airway cross-section: the mucus area ratio and the mucus contact ratio. These parameters were calculated using three different mathematical methods (slice, skeleton, and geodesic), as detailed in the Methods section. The three-dimensional rendered images of the representative adult βENaC-tg mouse from the study subgroup visually represent the magnitude of these ratios along the airway tree, with a colour gradient ranging from green (lowest values) to red (highest values). In the geodesic method, unconnected components are highlighted in blue and were excluded from the analysis. Note the different ranges for the area (0–30%) and the contact ratio (0–100%). Scale bar: 1 mm. βENaC-tg = βENaC-transgenic. SRCT = synchrotron radiation-based computed tomography.