Figure 1.

Effect of injury on oxidative DNA damage and BBB dysfunction within the ventral optic nerve, relative to sham injury. Area (A) and mean intensity (B) of 8OHDG immunoreactivity within the ventral optic nerve were assessed to determine the level of oxidative DNA damage. Graphs display individual data points overlaid on a bar displaying the mean ± SEM. n = 9–10 rats per group. Statistical analysis by t-tests. (D) Area of IgG immunointensity within the ventral nerve was assessed to determine the extent of BBB breach. Graph displays individual data points overlaid on a bar displaying the mean ± SEM. Statistical analysis by Mann-Whitney test. n = 9–10 rats per group. (E) The area of IgG immunointensity was correlated to the area of 8OHDG using Spearman’s correlation, with the r_s value and corresponding p-value displayed on the graph. The mean area of IgG immunointensity was plotted on a log scale to best illustrate the overall relationship between IgG and 8OHDG on the scatterplot. Each data point on the graph represents an individual animal. n = 8–10 rats per group. (C,F) Representative images of both 8OHDG and IgG immunoreactivity in sham and injured rats are shown, scale bars = 100 μm. Area of the ventral nerve is denoted by dotted lines. All areas above threshold measurements are presented in arbitrary units as the data have been normalized to the total area of the ventral nerve for each animal. No outliers were removed for any outcome measure. Significant differences are indicated by *** p ≤ 0.001, **** p ≤ 0.0001.