Fig. 6.

Atherosclerotic lesions exacerbated by periodontitis contain cells expressing both endothelial and mesenchymal protein markers. a Immunofluorescence staining of PECAM-1 (red), SM22α (left panel; green), NOTCH-3 (middle panel; green) and SNAI-1 (right panel; green) in the aortic arches of the mice. Enlarged images are shown on the right-bottom side in each image. Scale bars: 20 μm. Nuclei were stained with DAPI (blue). L, lumen; P, plaque; N, necrotic area. White arrows indicate co-expressed cells with both of two signals such as PECAM-1 and SM22α, PECAM-1 and NOTCH-3, or PECAM-1 and SNA-I1. b–d Quantification of the number of luminal endothelial cells expressing SM22α, NOTCH-3 and SNAI-1. n.s. not significant. *P < 0.05; ***P < 0.001 in one-way ANOVA