Pelvic Organ Support in Animals with Partial Loss of Fibulin-5 in the Vaginal Wall
Fig 5
Effect of pregnancy and vaginal delivery on Fbln5 cKO mice.
A. Perineal body length was measured at time 0 (prior to pregnancy) and 12 h to 12 wks postpartum in Fbln5f/f/SMA++/Cre+ (Preg cKO, n = 7) and Fbln5f/f/SMA++/Cre- mice (Preg Ctl, n = 6) during 3 pregnancies. B. Gelatin zymography of vaginal tissue extracts from Fbln5f/f/SMA++/Cre+ (cKO) and Fbln5f/f/SMA++/Cre- (Ctl) mice 48 h postpartum. Vaginal tissue extracts from Fblin5-/- (Fib5 KO) and Mmp9-/- (MMP9 KO) mice were used as positive and negative controls. Lane 2 is blank. C. Immunoblot of Fbln5 in urea extracts of vaginal muscularis from wild type nonpregnant control (WT NP), cKO, and Ctl animals 48 h postpartum. Arrow denotes cleaved form. All animals were treated with doxycycline at 6 weeks of age, mated, and tissues collected after the first pregnancy.