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. 2023 Jan 10;119(4):982–997. doi: 10.1093/cvr/cvad005

Figure 1.

Figure 1

SFA-EAA diet prevents systolic dysfunction caused by pressure overload. (A) Schematic overview of SFA and SFA-EAA feeding protocol to male C57BL/6N mice exposed to sham or transverse aortic constriction (TAC) surgery. Mice were fed with the two diets for 10 days before surgery and for additional 4 weeks after surgery, when cardiac parameters were assessed (if not otherwise indicated). (B and C) Heart weight (B) and lung weight (C) normalized to tibia length (HW/TL) (LW/TL) (n = 9 mice per group). (D) Percentage fractional shortening (FS %) and (E) relative ejection fraction (EF %) in sham- and TAC-operated mice fed with SFA or SFA-EAA diet were quantified by echocardiography (n = 10 mice per group). (F) Left, representative cross-sections of LV from mice fed with SFA or SFA-EAA diet, subjected to sham or TAC surgery, and stained with Azan’s trichrome collagen staining. Scale bars 50 µm. Right, quantification of the fibrotic area showed as the ratio between collagen content vs. area of LV (n = 3 mice per group). (G) Quantification of cardiomyocyte cross-sectional area (CSA) using wheat germ agglutinin (WGA) staining. (H) Gene expression analysis (qRT-PCR) of hypertrophy and fibrosis markers in LV tissue (n = 4 animals per group). All data are presented as mean ± SEM. *P < 0.05, **P < 0.01, and ***P < 0.001 vs. sham-operated mice fed with SFA diet; #P < 0.05, ##P < 0.01, and ###P < 0.001 vs. TAC-operated mice fed with SFA diet; comparison was performed by two-way ANOVA followed by post hoc Tukey’s test.