Effects of X-ray and carbon-ion beam irradiation on pathological cardiac remodeling in mice

Figures

• 

  Fig. 1. Echocardiographic trends: Pre-treatment, pre-irradiation, and every 2 weeks up to 8 weeks post-irradiation. Mice were age- and weight-matched at the time of TAC surgery. Heart condition: Normal line, TAC group; broken line, control group. Irradiation conditions: Black, non-irradiation; green, X-ray irradiation; red, C-ion irradiation. (A) LV percent fractional shortening (FS). (B) LV mass (LVM). (C) Left ventricular end-systolic dimension (LVDs). (D) Left ventricular end-diastolic dimension (LVDd). (Supplementary Fig. 5 shows ratio to pre-treatment level). At pre-irradiation time point comparisons were performed using unpaired, two-tailed Student’s t-test written in black. Group comparisons were performed using repeated measurements ANOVA written in red. *P < 0.05 vs Control without irradiation; **P < 0.01 vs Control without irradiation; +P < 0.05 vs TAC without irradiation; ++P < 0.01 vs TAC without irradiation; $$P < 0.01 vs TAC with X-ray irradiation.

• 

  Fig. 2. Average HW (n = 5 mice/group) at 8 weeks post-irradiation. HW/BW ratio. *P < 0.05; **P < 0.01 vs control without irradiation.

• 

  Fig. 3. Histological findings at 8 weeks post-irradiation. (A) Left, middle: Representative microscopic image of cardiomyocytes in a tissue cross-section stained with Masson trichrome. Cardiomyocytes stained red, fibrotic area stained blue and pointed by red arrow. Scale bars: 1 mm and 100 μm. Right: Representative microscopic image of cardiomyocytes in a tissue cross-section stained with WGA. The identification of cardiomyocytes is shown in Supplementary Fig. 4. Scale bars: 10 μm. (B) Mean CSA obtained by Masson trichrome staining. (C) Median CSA obtained by WGA staining. *P < 0.05, **P < 0.01 vs control without irradiation, +P < 0.05 vs TAC without irradiation.

• 

  Fig. 4. mRNA levels were assessed by reverse transcription–quantitative PCR (RT-qPCR) and normalized to Gapdh and then to the control group without irradiation. *P < 0.05; **P < 0.01. Exact P-values are provided in the results section for each comparison.