The Spatiotemporal Development of Intercalated Disk in Three-Dimensional Engineered Heart Tissues Based on Collagen/Matrigel Matrix
Figure 2
Immunofluorescent staining and quantification of ID-related proteins of the EHTs cultured for 3, 7 and 14 days.
(A–D) At day 3, the cell membranes were positively stained with N-cadherin, Cx43, PKP2 and PG. (E–H) At day 7, N-cadherin (E), PKP2 (G) and PG (H) staining were positive and mainly localized to the contact sites of adjacent cells (arrow). Whereas the Cx43 positive staining was distributed along the whole plasma membrane in a punctuate pattern (F). (I–L) At day 14, ID-related proteins concentrated at the polar ends (arrow) of cardiomyocytes. (M) The FI of N-Cadherin, PKP2 and PG decreased from day 3 to 7 but increased at day 14. Cx43 was expressed the opposite. **p<0.01; *p<0.05.