Fig. 2: Influenza induces subcutaneous adipose tissue browning.
a Representative images of hematoxylin/eosin staining of SCAT sections from mock-treated and IAV-infected mice at 7 dpi, n = 7 mock-treated animals and n = 7 IAV-infected animals. Brown-like/beige adipocytes are arrowheaded. b Frequency distributions (%) of adipocyte sizes (areas, μm2) in the SCAT from mock-treated and IAV-infected mice, 7 dpi, n = 6 mock-treated animals and n = 6 IAV-infected animals. Individuals values, as well as means ± SD are shown. *p < 0.05, **p < 0.01. c Western blot of UCP1 in lanes loaded with EWAT, lung, and SCAT protein lysates from mock-treated and IAV-infected mice at 7 dpi. GAPDH was used as an internal loading control. The figure is representative of four independent blots covering a total of: SCAT from n = 5 mock-treated animals (SCAT mock), SCAT from n = 35 IAV-infected animals (SCAT IAV), EWAT from n = 5 IAV-infected animals (EWAT IAV), and lungs from n = 5 IAV-infected animals (Lung IAV). Of note, the uncropped version of the blot is shown on Supplementary Fig. 2d. d Quantification of normalized densitometric UCP1/GAPDH ratios (arbitrary units) of all western blots. **p < 0.01, ****p < 0.0001. e Infrared thermography measurement (°C) of SCAT surface temperature at 7 dpi, n = 3 mock-treated animals and n = 4 IAV-infected animals. Individuals values, as well as means ± SD are shown. **p < 0.01. Representative infrared images of the SCAT area from mock-treated and IAV-infected mice are shown. Differences between mock-treated and IAV-infected groups (b, d, e), and between SCAT IAV and EWAT IAV (d) were considered significant when p < 0.05.
