Fig. 1.

Sweat gland-like structures formed in 3D culture are influenced by human fibroblast cells. a H&E images of sweat gland tubule-like structures in gels with or without fibroblasts, and the normal human sweat gland structure. Fibroblasts are indicated with a blue circle, the shape of the tubule-like structure with a blue dashed circle, and the lumen of the tubule-like structure with a red dashed circle. Scale bar 15 µm. b The number of sweat gland tubule-like structures formed in culture with different densities of fibroblasts with a fixed density of SG cells (see methods for quantification) (n = 3). c Comparison of the number of sweat gland tubule-like structures formed by three different fibroblast cell lines with a fixed density of SG cells (n = 3). d Immunofluorescence staining of sweat gland tubule-like structures formed by fibroblasts and sweat gland cells for sweat gland-related makers: EDA, EDAR, K8 and CEA (red); nuclei (blue) were stained with DAPI. The shape of the tubule-like structures is indicated by a white dashed circle and the lumen of the tubule-like structures by a red dashed circle. Scale bar 15 µm. (Color figure online)