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. 2018 Aug 2;42(4):1935–1944. doi: 10.3892/ijmm.2018.3802

Figure 2.

Figure 2

Slit2 inhibits reactivity of astrocytes and ameliorates AQP4 polarization in the aging mouse brain. The polarity of AQP4 and reactivity of astrocytes (GFAP-positive cells) was evaluated by immunofluorescence staining. (A) GFAP-positive cells were widespread in the cortex and hippocampus of the aging brains of Slit2-Tg and WT mice (magnification, ×250; scale bar=250 µm). (B) Quantitative analysis of the mean pixel intensity of GFAP in the (a) cortex and (b) hippocampus. (C) Immunofluorescence (a) double-labeling of GFAP and AQP4 (magnification, ×250; scale bar=250 µm) showed (b) expression of AQP4 distributed around the astrocytic endfeet, with less in the astrocytic soma in Slit2-Tg mice, whereas the opposite was observed in the WT mice (magnification, ×750; scale bar=75 µM). (D) Low stringency images show all AQP4-immunoreactive pixels in the image, high stringency images captured all pixels around perivascular endfeet in (a) WT mice and (b) Slit2 mice (magnification, ×250; scale bar=250 µm). (E) AQP4 polarity was derived as the ratio of low stringency:high stringency. Each value is expressed as the mean ± standard deviation. *P<0.05, **P<0.01 and ***P<0.001; n=6 per group). Slit2, slit guidance ligand 2; Tg, transgenic; WT, wild-type; GFAP, glial fibrillary acidic protein; AQP4, aquaporin-4.