Fig. 1
Characterization of bone marrow-derived pEPCs. pEPCs were extracted from murine bone marrow. a The morphology of pEPCs after 7 and 14 days of culture was detected with an optical microscope. Early pEPCs showed a spindle-shape morphology on day 7. On day 14, late pEPCs presented an endothelium-like, cobblestone-like morphology. Early pEPCs were positive for Dil-Ac-LDL and UEA-1 (pEPCs incorporated acetylated low-density lipoprotein (red) and bound UEA-I (green)). b Flow cytometry showed high expression of CD34, CD45 and c-kit. Meanwhile, early pEPCs were positive for CD14, CD133, CD309 and CD105 and exhibited low CD31 expression. Single samples of 2 × 105 cells were analyzed via flow cytometry, and all the above experiments were carried out at least in triplicate. Scale bar, 200 μm