Figure 3. Association of tau oligomers with vascular endothelium and smooth muscle in Alzheimer’s disease brain.

Representative images of brain sections from AD patients and age-matched controls reacted with (A) antibodies specific for tau oligomers (T22, red) and the endothelial cell marker Von Willebrand Factor (vWF, green). (B) Quantitative analysis shows increased tau oligomer immuonoreactivity in the cerebrovasculature of AD and PSP patients compared to age-matched controls [Control-AD **, q=5.24 and p=0.0078, Control-PSP **, q=6.728 and p=0.0013, AD-PSP, q=1.03 and p=0.7517 as a result of Tukey’s post hoc test applied to a significant effect of group in ANOVA, F(2,12)=13.03, p=0.001]. (C) Representative images of brain sections from AD patients and age-matched controls reacted with antibodies specific for tau oligomers (T22, red) and the vascular smooth muscle cell marker smooth muscle actin (SMA, green). (D) Quantitative analysis demonstrates increased tau oligomer immuonoreactivity associated with smooth muscle actin-positive cells [***, t(4)=15.35, p=0.0001). For all studies, n=2 brains/group; 10-15 sections from each sample were analyzed for tau oligomers. All AD and PSP samples were tested and were positive for tau oligomers. Mean percent colocalization values ± SEM are shown as insets. Data in panels B and D were also included in the analyses of tau oligomer abundance in Figure 1P.