Journal: Bioactive Materials
Article Title: Skin derived precursors induced Schwann cells mediated tissue engineering-aided neuroregeneration across sciatic nerve defect
doi: 10.1016/j.bioactmat.2023.11.016
Figure Lengend Snippet: | Repair of sciatic nerve defect in rat by TEN. (a) At 4 w, 8 w, 12 w post-surgery, CatWalk™ gait analysis system was applied to obtain the sciatic function index (SFI) of animals which were bridged with TENs, autologous nerve grafts and chitosan/fibroin scaffolds, respectively. Representative footprints at 12 w post-surgery were indicated by dotted ellipse. (b) Histogram comparing the SFI values among three groups at different time points post-surgery. * p < 0.05 versus TEN group, # p < 0.05 versus autograft group and § p < 0.05 versus scaffold group. (c) Representative CMAP recordings at 12 weeks post-surgery, were obtained from the injured side of animals in scaffold, TEN, autograft groups and on the contralateral uninjured side of animals, respectively. (d) Histograms showing the recovery ratios of the motor nerve conduction velocity and CMAP amplitude detected on the injured side of animals in the scaffold, TEN and autograft groups, respectively. * p < 0.05 versus TEN group, and # p < 0.05 versus autograft group. (e) Representative fluorescence micrographs following FluoroGold™ (FG) retrograde nerve tracing. FG retrogradely labeled motor neurons in the spinal cord and sensory neurons in DRGs (double-labeled with Hoechst 33342 (blue) for clearly showing outlines of the sensory neurons). The high magnifications of the boxed areas clearly showed the FG-labeled motor neurons in longitudinal sections of spinal cord, respectively. Scale bar: 250 μm for low magnifications of spinal cord, 100 μm for high magnifications of spinal cord and 50 μm for DRGs. (f) Masson's trichrome staining obtained at 12 weeks post-surgery, of the sectioned gastrocnemius muscle. Scale bar, 20 mm. Histograms showing the wet weight ratio of total anterior tibialis and gastrocnemius muscle, and the cross-sectional area of gastrocnemius muscle fibers. Data are expressed as means ± SD. * p < 0.05 versus TEN group, # p < 0.05 versus autograft group and § p < 0.05 versus the scaffold group. (g) Photomicrographs of longitudinal sections of gastrocnemius muscles at the injured side after α-bungarotoxin staining of motor endplates (red) and immunohistochemistry with anti-NF200 (green) of regenerated axons were applied to animals in three groups at 12 weeks after nerve grafting and the contralateral uninjured side muscle. Scale bar: 20 μm. (h) Illustration of histological observation and morphometric analysis of the regenerated nerve at 12 weeks post-surgery. (i) Meyer trichrome staining, double immunostaining with anti-NF200 (green) and anti-S100 (red), and transmission electron micrographs (high magnifications for myelin lamellae), obtained at 12 weeks post-surgery. Scale bar: 10 μm for Meyer trichrome staining sections, 20 μm for immunostaining photomicrographs, 5 μm for TEM images and 0.2 mm for myelin lamellae images. Histograms showing the thickness of the regenerated myelin sheath (j), the diameter of regenerated myelinated nerve fibers (k), and the number of regenerated myelin lamella (l). Data are expressed as means ± SD. One-way ANOVA and the post hoc Bonferroni t -test were used to analyze the data. * p < 0.05 versus TEN group, # p < 0.05 versus autograft group and § p < 0.05 versus the contralateral uninjured side of animals. (m) To analysis of myelinated nerve fibers in regenerated nerves, normalized frequency distributions of G-ratios (axon/fiber diameter) in scaffold, TEN, autograft groups and the contralateral uninjured side of animals, respectively. The distribution of regenerated nerves in TEN group and the contralateral uninjured side were similar and significantly different from that of the scaffold and autograft groups ( p < 0.05, KolmogorovSmirnov test). Nine animals per group were used for measurements.
Article Snippet: To clearly show the regenerated axons and myelin, mouse anti-NF200 monoclonal antibody and rabbit anti-S100β polyclonal antibody (Sigma-Aldrich, USA) were applied to nerve sections and allowed to incubate overnight at 4 °C.
Techniques: Fluorescence, Labeling, Staining, Muscles, Immunohistochemistry, Double Immunostaining, Transmission Assay, Immunostaining