Figure 4.

SOX9 immunohistochemical evaluation in 3D AMSC-derived chondropellets at 7, 14, 21, and 28 days of culture through computerized densitometric measurements and image analysis. (A) control group (chondrogenic medium: CM); (B) CAG-supplemented group (CM + CAG). The smaller attached images represent the image analyses by the software: red color corresponds to brown staining (immune complexes labelled with chromogen). (C) Graph representing the level of staining expressed as densitometric count (pixel²) normalized to the area of each section expressed in pixel². Results were presented as the mean ± SD. ANOVA was used to evaluate the significance of the results. ** p < 0.01; **** p < 0.0001; ns, not significant. See the Materials and Methods section for details. (A,B) Objective lens, 10×; scale bar: 100 μm.