Fig. 2.

SAK3 treatment improves neuronal morphology and causes glial cells activation in the cerebral cortex of TAF1 gene edited rats. (A) The morphology of the cerebral cortex was evaluated by Nissl Staining. The Nissl staining showed shrunken neurons with vacuolated intercellular spaces and many unstained regions of the somatosensory motor cortex pyramidal neurons in layer 5 after TAF1 gene editing. SAK3 administration to the TAF1 edited animals improved the morphology of the cortical neurons. (B) Enumeration of the cells in each treatment group. Note decreased cell viability in TAF-1 edited animals compared to the control groups and animals treated with SAK3. (C) Expression of GFAP was decreased in TAF1-edited animals as compared to naïve and CRISPR-control groups. SAK3 administration to the TAF1 edited animals shows increased the number of GFAP positive cells. (D) Number of GFAP positive cells in each of the experimental conditions. Data are shown as mean ± S.E.M., n = 12 fields per animal, 4 animals per experimental condition. *p < 0.05 versus; naïve, #p < 0.05 versus gRNA-control (ANOVA followed by Tukey’s test). Scale bars: 200 μm. The experiments were conducted in a blinded fashion.