Transient receptor potential vanilloid 1-immunoreactive signals in murine enteric glial cells

Figure 6 Specific decrease in the number of myenteric plexus cells in knockout mice. The cells were prepared from longitudinal muscle layer-myenteric plexus (LM-MP) of wild-type (WT) and KO mice simultaneously, using the same digestion solution in a single preparation. After 11-d culture, the numbers of α smooth muscle actin (αSMA)+ smooth muscle cells (SMCs), glial fibrillary acidic protein (GFAP)⁺ cells and αSMA^-GFAP^- cells were determined as described in Materials and Methods. Nuclei were stained with DAPI. The percentage of GFAP⁺ cells and SMCs was calculated as the ratio of the number of each cell population to the number of total DAPI⁺ cells. The yield of enteric glial cells (EGCs, GFAP+ cells) in KO mice was significantly lower than that in WT mice, while the number of SMCs obtained was similar for both types of mice. Data represent mean ± SEM, n = 4. ^bP < 0.01. KO: Knockout.