Fig. 6. Adult neural stem cell lineage-specific deletion of Vegf impedes recovery and repair.

a Timeline of experiments in control and VEGF mice. b Confocal images demonstrating VEGF loss in tdTomato⁺ cells in Nestin^CreERT2+/-; VEGF^fl/fl; Ai14 mice. c Efficiency of VEGF cKO. n = 3 mice/group. ***t(4) = 51.23, p < 0.0001. Two-tailed t test. d Representative images of tdTomato⁺ cells in peri-infarct cortex two weeks post-stroke. e There was no difference in peri-infarct tdTomato⁺ cell density between controls and VEGF cKO mice, indicating that the migratory response was unaffected. n = 5 controls, n = 7 VEGF cKO. t(10) = 1.18, p = 0.266. Two-tailed t test. f VEGF cKO significantly impaired motor recovery measured with the single-seed reaching task (n = 12 control, n = 11 VEGF cKO). Two-way repeated measures ANOVA and post-hoc Sidak’s tests between groups for each timepoint. Time x group interaction F(4, 84) = 9.2, p < 0.001. **p = 0.005, ***p ≤ 0.0002. g Representative confocal images and quantification (h) of vasculature. *t(22) = 2.8, p = 0.011. ***t(21) = 4.1, p = 0.0005. Two-tailed t tests. n = 12 controls, n = 11 VEGF cKO mice. i Confocal images of new endothelial cells in peri-infarct cortex. j The number of BrdU⁺ ERG⁺ nuclei was significantly less in VEGF cKO mice. ***t(15.0) = 4.2, p = 0.0008, Welch’s corrected two-way t test. n = 12 controls, n = 11 VEGF cKO mice. k Experimental timeline. l Image shows AAV5-CaMKiiα-eGFP labeling in peri-infarct cortex (representative of 17 mice). Asterisk indicates lesion core. m Representative images and quantification (n) of dendritic spine density. Spine density was significantly lower in VEGF cKO mice. **t(15) = 3.0, p = 0.009. Two-tailed t test. Apical dendrites were sampled from layer II/III between 100 and 700 μm from the infarct border. 2631 spines were counted along 7.9 mm total length of dendrite in controls (n = 9 mice). 1934 spines were counted along 6.9 mm total length of dendrite in cKO mice (n = 8 mice). Data are presented as mean ± SEM. Individual datapoints representing males are shown as circles; datapoints representing females are shown as squares. Source data are provided as a Source Data file.