Intersectional lineage tracing shows the contribution of endocardial-derived MCs to SMCs in adult hearts.
A, immunostaining for tdTomato, CDH5, and aSMA on heart sections from adult Nfatc1–Dre;Sox9–CreER;Ai66 mice, which were treated with tamoxifen at E9.5. The arrows indicate perivascular tdTomato+aSMA+ SMCs. The boxed region in the left panel is magnified in the right panels. LV, left ventricle. Scale bars, 100 μm. B, the cell counting result showing the percentage of tdTomato+ SMCs in ventricular free walls and septum (n = 4 mice). C, immunostaining for PDGFB and CDH5 on heart sections at E13.5. The boxed region in the left panel is magnified in the right panel. Scale bars, 100 μm. D, in situ hybridization for Pdgfb on heart sections at E13.5. Scale bar, 200 μm. DAPI, 4′,6′-diamino-2-phenylindole. Each picture is representative of three individual mouse samples.