Table 3.
Summary of the morphometric analysis performed to evaluate c-Kit+/SCF+ mast cells around glands.
| Analysis | EXPERIMENTAL GROUPS | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| NS | vs | CN | vs | DN | vs | M | |
| SCF+ mast cells immunolabeling positivity at 20x magnification | 0.009901 ± 0.000678 |
**** | 0.018071 ± 0.000614 |
**** | 0.025568 ± 0.001080 |
**** | 0.044227 ± 0.005330 |
| c-Kit+ mast cells immunolabeling positivity at 20x magnification | 0.005852 ± 0.000549 |
* | 0.010092 ± 0.000707 |
**** | 0.018666 ± 0.000847 |
**** | 0.03912 ± 0.003842 |
| Number of SCF+ mast cells/field at 20x magnification | 9 ± 1 |
ns | 11 ± 2 |
** | 18 ± 2 |
**** | 27 ± 6 |
| Number of c-Kit+ mast cells/field at 20x magnification | 7 ± 2 |
** | 14 ± 3 |
*** | 22 ± 3 |
**** | 39 ± 6 |
The morphometric values are expressed as mean ± SD (n= 5 for normal skin (NS) group and n=10 for the others) and have been utilised for the graphs in Figures 2 – 4 . Tukey’s post-test was used to compare all groups after One-way ANOVA and Spearman for correlation (ns, not significative; * p ≤ 0.05; ** p ≤ 0.01; ***p ≤ 0.001; ****p ≤ 0.0001).