Figure 1.

A lower number of progenitors was detected in the distal fallopian tube epithelium of patients who underwent tubal ligation. (A) Immunohistochemistry demonstrated the representative distribution of CD44 expression in the fimbria of intact fallopian tubes (a and c) versus ligated patient samples (b and d). A lower number of basally located CD44-positive cells was seen in both pre- (a vs b) and postmenopausal (c vs d) tubal ligation patient samples. Arrows point to individual CD44-positive basal epithelial cells. (B) The median percentage of distal fallopian tube epithelial progenitors (basally located CD44-positive epithelial cells) was reduced with tubal ligation. Dot plot summarizes and compares data points of all clinical samples, confirming a statistically significant difference at P = .0113. Horizontal bars represent the median for each cohort and the vertical bars denote interquartile range.