Fig. 5.

AntagomiR-17-treated OEPCs increase blood flow recovery and capillary density in a mouse model of hindlimb ischemia. a, b Unilateral limb ischemia was induced in female CD1 nude mice by occlusion of the left femoral artery. Immediately after occlusion, the ischemic muscles were injected with 3 million antagomiR-17-transfected OEPCs or 3 million control antagomiR-transfected OEPCs. Control group received only EBM-2. Blood flow recovery was measured using high-resolution laser color Doppler imaging and calculated (n = 12 mice/experimental group) as a ratio of ischemic over contralateral foot blood flow. c–e 21 days after surgery, limb muscles were harvested and prepared for immunohistochemical analyses. Capillary density in the adductor muscle was measured by staining with isolectin B4 (revealing endothelial cells) (c). The relative amount of positive cells was counted in eight randomly selected high-power fields (magnification ×20). Scale bars, 20 μm. (d, e). Data were shown as mean ± SEM. One-way ANOVA followed by a Bonferroni post test was used for statistical analysis. *P ≤ 0.05,**P ≤ 0.01, and ***P ≤ 0.001