Fig. 4.

Endogenous lumican does not suppress aortic sprouting or vascularization of Matrigel plugs. a Aortas were isolated from wild-type (WT), heterozygous lumican knockout (Het), or homozygous lumican knockout (KO) mice and sectioned then, implanted into fibrin gels. Aortic cultures were inspected daily for angiogenic sprouting. The time required to initiate angiogenic sprouting is depicted as the percent number of sprouting rings over a 9-day window until 100 % of rings had sprouted. Data presented is the average of four individual experiments each consisting of at least 5 aortic rings for each genotype. b The final length of angiogenic sprouts was measured (pixel length) and average length compared to WT rings is depicted. c Lumican mRNA expression was confirmed in WT culture of aortic rings. A negative reverse transcription (-RT) control was used to control for specific lumican mRNA amplification. d Representative images of WT, Het, and KO aortic ring cultures after 9 days in culture. e Solutions of Matrigel containing 300 ng/ml of bFGF were injected subcutaneously into WT, Het, and lumican KO mice. After 10 days, the resulting Matrigel plugs were dissected and blood content was compared as a sign of vascularization. f RT-PCR was used as in C to confirm expression of lumican in control Matrigel plugs