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. 2026 Jul 24;18(1):2702948. doi: 10.1080/17590914.2026.2702948

Figure 10.

Coronal brain sections showing GFAP immunolabeling in sham and stroke conditions 9-months after 30 min MCA occlusion, with labeled regions and bar graphs of GFAP intensity ratio and cell counts. Four panel figure (A-D) features coronal brain sections depicting GFAP immunolabeling in sham and stroke conditions, 9 months post-stroke. Panel A shows minimal GFAP presence in the sham ACA cortex, MCA cortex, and striatum. Panel B highlights increased GFAP immunolabeling in the same regions of the stroke ipsilateral hemisphere compared to contralateral, particularly in the striatum. Panels C and D display bar charts of GFAP intensity ratios and GFAP+ cell counts/mm² quantifying the increase in GFAP level in stroke ipsilesional hemisphere. Scale Bars included in images.

Reactive astrocytes remain chronically elevated in the MCA territory up to 9 months later. (A,B) Example GFAP-labeled coronal mouse brain sections (top) 9 months after a sham (A) or MSCI (B) surgery, with numbered regions indicating higher magnification images shown below. (C) Global GFAP intensity ratio (ipsilesional:contralateral) from each region from sham (white bars) or MSCI (red bars) animals 9 months after surgery. Red asterisks denote significance compared to 1.0 (no difference between hemispheres). Black asterisks denote significance between groups. (D) Density of GFAP-positive astrocyte cell bodies in each region of sham (white) mice and the contralateral (grey) and ipsilesional (red) hemispheres of MSCI mice, 9 months after surgery. Black asterisks denote significant difference between groups. Data displayed as median (IQR). Each dot represents an animal. *p < 0.05, ***p < 0.001, ****p < 0.0001. Scale bars = 100 µm.