FIG 8.

Liver zonation and response to cGH infusion. Heat maps of the relative gene expression values in each liver zone, ordered from the central vein (PC, pericentral) to the portal tract (PP, periportal), are shown, as described previously (48). Separate heat maps are shown for cGH responsive male-biased and female-biased genes that show significant spatial zonation (q value < 0.2), as defined earlier (48). (A) Female-biased genes, early responding (clusters F1 and F2) compared to not early responding (clusters F3 to F5). (B) Male-biased genes, early responding (clusters M1 and M2) compared to not early responding (clusters M3 to M5). Yellow, high expression; blue, low expression. Genes are ordered by the PC/PP ratio (average of zonation layers 1 to 3/average of layers 7 to 9) (48). Statistical significance was determined by the Wilcoxon rank sum test of the zonation bias of all genes in the group, as explained in Materials and Methods.