Fig. 7. Functional KRT82 expression is reduced in AA HF and skin.

a IF staining of KRT82 (green) in human healthy control and AA HF. Dashed line outlines the cuticle, dotted line represents the Line of Auber. IF staining with similar results was repeated in 1 additional control sample and 2 additional AA samples (biological replicates) b RNA expression of KRT82 from whole skin scalp biopsies of control, AAP nonlesional sites, AAP lesional sites, and AT/AU sites. Each circle represents one sample. Statistical analysis was performed using two-tailed unpaired t-test with Welch’s correction. *p = 0.028, ****p < 0.0001. n = 98 individuals (36 controls, 30 AAP, 32 ATAU). c Scalp RNA expression of patients carrying KRT82 variants at nonlesional (Variant Nonlesional) and lesional (Variant Lesional) sites compared to AA patients without KRT82 variants (Nonlesional and Lesional) and controls without AA or KRT82 variants. n = 32 individuals (12 controls and 20 AAP patients). Expression data is displayed in boxplots in which each sample data point is represented by individual dots; the center line denotes the median; upper and lower limits of the box denote 75th and 25th percentiles, respectively; and the whiskers indicate the dataset maximum and minimum. d IHC of KRT82 and CD8 in healthy control and lesional biopsies in three AA patients with missense variants. AA biopsies are from individual patients and serve as 3 biological replicates. Staining in another control biopsy was not repeated; however, images were taken of other hair follicles, serving as technical replicates.