Fig. 7

Immunohistochemical analysis of the distribution of various TSPC populations at 1 week postoperation. Tendons were treated with vehicle or 29-mer/alginate gel immediately after surgery. BrdU was injected intraperitoneally on days 0, 3, and 5. Tendons were harvested on day 7. a CD146 immunostaining (brown) and counterstaining with hematoxylin. Representative images are from three independent experiments. HR, healing region. The digital image analysis of CD146⁺ TSPC was performed blinded on an average of six randomly selected × 400 magnification fields from each section using a Nikon Eclipse 80i microscope equipped with a Leica DC 500 camera. *P < 0.05 versus vehicle-treated group. b CD146 and BrdU double immunostaining. Insets are the images before superimposition. Representative images are from three independent experiments. c Nucleostemin and BrdU double-immunostaining. Arrows indicate nucleostemin/BrdU double-positive TSPC. Representative images from three independent experiments with six rats per group are shown. Percentages of nucleostemin/BrdU double-positive cells per total nucleostemin⁺ cells were evaluated. *P < 0.002 versus vehicle group