Figure 3.

Apoptotic cells in the SGZ of the dentate gyrus after irradiation express phenotypic markers for neural progenitors. Apoptotic cells (arrows) demonstrate immunoreactivity for DCX (a–c), nestin (d–f), Sox2 (g–i) or musashi-1 (j–l), phenotypic markers of neural progenitors. Apoptotic cells are identified by their characteristic morphological features of nuclear condensation and fragmentation after DAPI nuclear staining (arrows, b, e, h and k). Colocalization of immunoreactivity of phenotypic markers and DAPI are shown in the merged pictures (c, f, i and l). The apoptotic cells (arrows) are negative for NeuN (m–o), GC (p–r) and GFAP (s–u), markers for neurons, oligodendrocytes and astrocytes, respectively