B2 adrenergic receptors and morphological changes of the enteric nervous system in colorectal adenocarcinoma

Figure 5 Comparison of the percentage areas of the total analyzed tissue fragments for the submucosal, myenteric plexuses, as well as for the multi-axonal fiber bundles. For the above peripheral total nerve elements, G1 graded tumors had the smallest percentage areas, followed by normal colon tissue and G2-G3 differentiated tumors (A); Density of the Auerbach plexuses relative areas revealed a clearcut decrease from normal tissue to G1-G2-G3 gradings, with a minimum for G3 grading (B); Larger nervous bundles showed the same pattern as for the total analyzed areas (C), while differences between the relative areas of Meissner plexuses revealed the same pattern as for the Auerbach plexuses (D), revealing that the total and plexus areas variate in opposite directions when considering increasing gradings. ^aP < 0.05 and ^bP < 0.01 represent statistical significance on one-way analysis of variance with post hoc comparisons using the Bonferroni’s test. Error bars represent standard errors of the mean.